Antiques: Martha Dunn - Woman who became the big dipper

This required immense stamina and strength on the part of the operator - and one woman who fitted the bill was sturdy Martha Gunn (1726-1815), Queen of the Dippers in her in her native Brighton, popular as a health spa and resort from the 1780s.

Uneducated Martha, from a poor fishing family, became rich and famous, was doted on by the Prince of Wales (later George IV), dubbed "The Venerable Priestess of the Bath" by the newly-launched newspaper The Morning Herald and the subject of engravings, paintings and cartoons.

She helped transform Brighton from lacklustre fishing village to stylish resort and became so well-known that she joined a select band of celebrities afforded the privilege - or indignity - of being immortalised as a Toby jug. Subjects are often cruelly characterised but the trio which surfaced at Woolley & Wallis in Wiltshire in the collection of American Joseph Zellis (1922-2004), dating from 1790-1810, appeared kind compared to paintings and engravings, in which she is portrayed as enormous.

Best price - a high estimate £2,140 - was paid for a Prattware piece depicting Martha holding a blue vase. Another, showing her holding a flower, made £1,890 and the third, with Martha in a patterned yellow dress, went for £755. All three show her clutching a bottle of gin - her favourite tipple.

Another Toby jug, entitled Village Idiot, circa 1790, depicting a gap-toothed man in a blue coat holding a rounded jug of foaming beer, made a double estimate £3,780; a well-dressed squire £1,640; a pearlware figure of naval hero Lord Howe (1726-1799) £1,510; a Ralph Wood specimen of a sailor (or planter) £2,140; a Wood family "Thin Man", circa 1780, £2,015; a Yorkshire crown mark Prattware jug, circa 1810, featuring a chap with a jug on his knee and clutching a large pipe, £880; and, finally, a Mexborough pottery "Purple Face", 1780-1790, featuring a well-oiled fellow with a snake-coiled pipe, clutching, inevitably, an enormous jug, £2,140.

A bit more about mother-of-eight Martha Gunn (nee Killick), many of whose descendants still live in Brighton. Canny as well as large and strong, she set herself up in as a ladies' bathing attendant when the sea-bathing craze hit the town in the mid-1700s.

She was able to buy her own house, in East Street, Brighton, which still stands, and as her fame spread nationally, her image appeared on engravings, cartoons and a painting showing her with the Prince of Wales, who was such a fan he granted her free access to the royal kitchens. In one engraving, Martha was depicted repelling the invading French with a mop and, in a painting, standing behind the Prince and his secret wife, Maria Fitzherbert.

A bus, a pub and even a Brighton pop group are named after her and she was the subject of a rhyme, which reads:

To Brighton came he,

Came George III's son.

To be bathed in the sea,

By famed Martha Gunn.

Martha didn't earn the title Queen of the Dippers lightly. Not only did she possess supreme stamina over a 60-year career but she also developed many other skills, including a sensitive approach to "customer service", a deep knowledge of local currents and waves, ensuring her clients did not lose their balance or drown. She was so popular that 18th century ladies queued at her door, demanding to be bathed by her.

She died aged 89 and remains one of the most famous women in Brighton history and, arguably, one of the cleverest.

*If you are still wondering about knocker-up, it was a man's job, before alarm clocks, to rouse sleepers so they could get to work on time, usually by tapping on the bedroom window with a long pole.

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