The present sugar bowls are from either the service ordered from the Paris porcelain firm of Dihl et Guèrhard by Josephine de Beauharnais shortly after her divorce from Emperor Napoleon I, or the service ordered by her son Eugène de Beauharnais almost immediately thereafter. Each of the two services included two sucriers de table, and since they are completely openwork there is no space for the monograms E or J which are found on most of the other pieces and would help to better identify the present pair. At least one sucrier is in the Hermitage, identical to this one. A basket of the same type from the service (described as corbeille ronde, montée sur pied à jour), but larger and round, is also in the Hermitage.

Josephine's service comprised over 200 pieces and was intended for use at formal receptions held at Malmaison, her home outside Paris. Deliveries are recorded for 1811 and 1813. Josephine's son, Eugène de Beauharnais (1781-1824), commissioned a similar service for himself at about the same time. Smaller in scale, it included neither elaborate serving pieces nor the gilt biscuit figures of Cupid included in his mother's service. On his service, a simple script initial 'E' replaced her crowned crest.

Upon the death of Josephine at Malmaison in 1814, Eugène and his sister Hortense inherited the contents of their mother's home including the furnishings and paintings. Although works of art were sold to satisfy Josephine's debts, the Dihl et Guèrhard service was kept by Eugène and combined with his own. In 1839, his youngest son, Maximilian Joseph Eugène Auguste Napoleon de Beauharnais and 3rd Duke of Leuchtenberg, married Grand Duchess Maria Nikolaevna, daughter of Tsar Nicholas I of Russia and Empress Alexandra Feodorovna. The Tsar only agreed to this love match between his oldest daughter and a German duke with the proviso that the couple would reside in Russia. They lived in St. Petersburg, eventually moving into the newly built Mariinsky Palace, named after Maria.

The two Dihl et Guèrhard services were shipped to St. Petersburg in 1839 along with other works of art originally from Maximillian's grandmother's collection at Malmaison. They remained in possession of the Leuchtenberg family until 1919, at which time they were absorbed into the Hermitage collections. The widow of Maximillian and Maria's youngest son Georgii took responsibility for the two dessert services, known collectively as the Eugène de Beauharnais Service, and for the family's other works of art - both pieces originally from her husband's great-grandmother's collection at Malmaison and those inherited from her mother-in-law.

Wary of the politically volatile situation in St. Petersburg, she made a hand-written inventory of the holdings, submitting it 10 March 1919. Coverage under such a certificate meant that the Leuchtenberg Collection was now under the protection of the government and could not be removed from the premises. Regardless, Leuchtenberg House was taken over by the Soviet government (it became the Palace of Labor) and the works of art removed to storage at the Novo-Mikhailovsky Palace. From there, they were eventually moved to the Winter Palace and were absorbed into the collection of the Hermitage via the State Museum Fund. During Joseph Stalin's regime, works of art from the Hermitage collections were sold to the West as a way of obtaining hard currency.

The Leuchtenberg inscription in red on the underside of one bowl is the same as that on several of the pieces still in the Hermitage Museum in St. Petersburg today (see France in Russia, p. 48) and on three of the ice pails (glacières) at the château de Malmaison in France.

Although approximately 60 percent of the original compliment of Dihl et Guèrhard dessert wares is still retained in the Hermitage, pieces from these services can now be found at Malmaison and in other private collections. See Natalia Kasakiewitsch, "Das Service des Eugène de Beauharnais", Keramos, Heft 141, Juli 1993, p. 13-32 and T. Rappe, et al., France in Russia: Empress Josephine's Malmaison Collection, Exhibition Catalogue, Hermitage Rooms at Somerset House, London, 2007, pp. 41-55 and 86-93, cat. nos. 16-38 for a detailed discussion of the service, the history of its ownership and its decoration.

For further reading, please see:
Tamara Rappe, et al, France in Russia: Empress Josephine’s Malmaison Collection, exhibition catalogue, Hermitage Rooms at Somerset House, London, 2007, pp. 41-55 and 86-93, cat. nos. 16-38 for a detailed discussion of the service, the history of its ownership and its decoration. This also gives a description of one sucrier, reproduced in the catalogue of the exhibition.

Bernard Chevallier, “Les Services de Dihl et Guérhard de l’impératrice Joséphine et du prince Eugène”, Revue de la Société des Amis du Musée National de Céramique, no. 3, 1994, pp. 25-29 & 74-75. In addition to the history of the services, there is a complete list of the components of both parts, and a list of the components at Malmaison.

Natalia Kasakiewitsch, Das Service des Eugène de Beauharnais, Keramos 141, July 1993, pp. 13-32.