My mom gave me her old sterling silver dinnerware set that she got from her mom. She told me to be careful with it because she said it came from my grandfathers first marriage. She thought it was originally from Virginia. It is a set of twelve with a serving set also. One dinner fork is missing. All have “sterling” inscribed on them. A few of the pieces have this information 1847 ROGERS BROS 6 and then it looks like a circle like O. Some other pieces have 1847 ROGERS BROS 12 with something at the end that looks like a circle or perhaps the inc. symbol? What do you feel I have going on here. And what do you think it may be worth? Thanks for your help. From Virginia in Newnan, Georgia

Hi Virginia,

Because the word “sterling” is marked on your silver pieces we can say with confidence that you have sterling silverware which is .925 silver or 92.5% silver. Bcause we are precious metal refiners we don’t know too much about sterling silver manufactures and brands. Doing some quick research online, I found that the 1847 date is the founding date of Rogers Brother and does not refer to the date your pieces were made.

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Keep in mind that precious metal refiners, like Arch Enterprises will only pay customers based on the precious metal content of the items you send to us. It sounds like you have a pretty large set so I think it would be worth doing some research into exactly what you have and where the best place would be to sell.

Many sterling silver knives and serving pieces are weighted for usability purposes. So the handles are filled with some kind of cement or wax. We weigh these items separately from those that are 100% sterling such as forks and spoons. Once you separate out any pieces that might be weighted we would recommend weighing everything else on a postal scale. Then use our precious metal calculator which will give you a good idea of what your items are worth based on the silver value. (Make sure you check the 0.925 silver check box on the calculator).

Hope this information helps! Let us know if you need more information about selling your sterling silver to be recycled and refined.

Watch this video about finding the value of sterling silverware.

*Image displayed is only a representation of the items described in this blog post and may not be true images of the items in question.