Virtually nothing is known about the business or personal histories of Mark A. King or Edward Webb. They are listed in the 1867 edition of Pacific Coast Business Directory as assayers and bankers in Idaho. Subsequent references to one or the other partner in the firm have them in Silver City, Idaho Territory and Portland, Oregon. The Clifford sale cataloguers, from whom the information published here is derived, developed little else of value about the firm.
The 1867 edition of the Pacific Coast Business Directory lists King, Webb & Co. as engaging in assaying and banking in Idaho. Around the same time King, Myrick & Co. (successors to E. W. Tracy) was listed as doing business in Silver City, Idaho Territory, and being composed of Mark A. King and Edward Webb (located in Silver City) and Josiah Myrick (located in Portland, Oregon). The 1871-1873 edition of the Pacific Coast Business Directory lists Mark A. King as an assayer in Portland, Oregon. An 1868 prospectus of the War Eagle Mountain Tunnel Company, Owyhee District, Idaho Territory, listed Webb and Myrick as persons, among others, who could attest to the character of the person who wrote the prospectus.
2.29 oz King, Webb & Company. Silver City (?), Owyhee County, Idaho Territory. No. 14.
Overall appearance of Very Fine. An appealing little ingot. Like the Molitor bar to come, no obvious care seems to have been taken to prepare the faces to receive the punches, the Office of Internal Revenue stamp and ethnic logotype having been applied over a disfiguring cooling fissure. One corner of the bar has been sharply clipped. The piece is a nice, small square with good, medium silver gray color.
- Face: [K]ING WEBB & [Co] / OIR stamp / A[SSAY]ERS / OWYHEE.
- Back: Oz.2.29 / S$2.73 / G$2.60.
- Top side: blank.
- Bottom side: blank.
- Left side: No. 14.
- Right side: blank.
- Dimensions: 30.9 x 25.0 x 8.5 mm.
- Current weight: 71.41 gms.
From the John J. Ford, Jr. Collection
Provenance: Ex Clifford Collection (Bowers & Ruddy, March 18, 1982, lot 223).
[10/2007] https://auctions.stacksbowers.com/lots/view/3-AV6MR/king-webb-company-silver-city-owyhee-county-idaho-territory-silver-and-gold-assay-ingot-no-14 ($34,500)
2.29 oz King, Webb & Co. Assayers, Silver City, Idaho Territory. Gold and silver bar ($5.33)
Rectangular bar with trimmed corner bearing the stamp of KING, WEBB & CO. (the stamp is larger than the ingot, so the inscription is incomplete) on the obverse, together with the inscription ASSAYERS (only partially visible) and OWYHEE in three lines. At the center is a circular INTERNAL REVENUE stamp from a prepared punch. One end of the bar bears the serial No. 14/ The reverse contains specifications in three lines, all stamped from individual punches OZ 2.29 / S$2.73 / G$2.60.
Although the ingot offered here is not dated, presumably it was produced circa 1867-1870.
Bowers & Ruddy, Clifford Collection, Lot 223, 1982 March.
[03/1982] https://archive.org/details/henryhcliffordco1982bowe/page/n99/