Plate, 7.75 inches diameter. Brown transfer with polychrome clobbering. Printed maker's mark for Burgess & Leigh. This simple pattern features three sprigs of fruiting branches and stem placed around the well: plums, cherries, and strawberries. The border features three layered lines consisting of circles, half-squares, and dots.

The Hill Top Pottery, or Hill Pottery, formerly belonging to Ralph Wood, was for many years carried on by Samuel Alcock & Co., who rebuilt and enlarged it in 1839. In 1860, the works and general estate were purchased by Sir James Duke and Nephews, and continued by them until 1865, when they sold it to Thomas Ford, who in 1866 sold it to the Earthenware and Porcelain Company, by whom (under the management of Mr. R. Daniel, once a noted china manufacturer at Stoke, Hanley, and Burslem) it was carried on under the style of the “Hill Pottery Company, Limited, late S. Alcock & Co.”

The operations of the “Hill Pottery Company” were of short duration, for in 1867 it was put in liquidation and sold up, when the property again came into the hands of Mr. Ford. In the same year the works were divided, the china department being taken by Alcock and Diggory, and the earthenware part by “Burgess & Leigh (late S . Alcock & Co.),” by whom it was carried on under the style of “Burgess, Leigh & Co.”

The mark used by the firm is a beehive on a stand, with bees, a rose bush on either side, and a ribbon bearing the name of the pattern beneath, and under this the initials of the firm, “B. L. & Co.” Many of the patterns were registered.