Friday, 28 February 2025

John Cheere Cast Lead Dog

 

A Lead Sculpture of a Dog.

John Cheere.

Circa.1760.

Height 24" (61cm).

Provenance :- Sir Francis Dashwood, 2nd Bt. (1708-1781), West Wycombe Park, Buckinghamshire; by descent at West Wycombe to Sir Francis Dashwood, 11th Bt., until 1987; Sold Sotheby’s London;

 The Hon. Simon Sainsbury.

Cheere is known to have worked for Sir Francis Dashwood at West Wycombe at various times between 1751 and 1778 (payments of over £200 are recorded, which suggests a considerable amount of work when compared to the £800 Cheere received for his largest known commission, of no less than 98 lead sculptures for the Palace of Queluz in Portugal). 



 This  lead sculpture appears in two inventories from West Wycombe Park, firstly in 1782 (The Inventory of Sir Francis Dashwood’s Effects at West Wycombe Park, Room 16, Gallery ‘a lead figure of a dog’), and again in the house’s Heirloom Inventory, 1862, ‘A marble cast of a bull mastiff sejant (lead cast)’.

Sotheby’s London, European Works of Art, Sculpture, Metalwork and Pewter, 7th April  1987, lot 174 


http://www.harrislindsay.com/media/files/hl_09.pdf





Image below from the Conway Library.





Thursday, 27 February 2025

Part 1 - Samson Slaying the Philistine aka Cain and Abel.

 

 The Lead Statues of  Samson and the Philistine Part 1.

The Lead Groups.

Some notes and images.

This post includes particular reference to Richard Osgood (d.1724) of Stone Bridge, Hyde Park Corner and the first recorded lead Samson now at Chatsworth.

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 This post will be part of a series discussing the various lead statues and Groups made by John Cheere with particular reference to those in the gardens of Queluz Palace in Portugal. It will also put together notes on the Statuary Industry at Hyde Park Corner at the Western end of what is now Piccadilly.


The various versions of this group of Samson slaying the Philistine (frequently referred to as Cain and Abel in the 18th Century were based on the original Renaissance marble group by Giambologna which is now in the Victoria and Albert Museum which in turn was inspired by an original by Michelangelo.

The original by Michelangelo lacked the cloak and included a separate downtrodden figure (see the bronze statuette in The Met Museum New York).

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The first recorded lead replica of the group it appears, was supplied to Chatsworth in 1691, possibly by Richard Osgood (fl. 1691 d,1724) of Hyde Park Corner who is known to have produced a copy for Sutton Court (Chiswick House) in 1695 as well as other lead ornaments for Chatsworth. 

John Nost I (the Elder) who seems to have collaborated with Richard Osgood on several projects also supplied leadwork to Chatsworth and must have known the original marble sculpture because of his commissions for Buckingham House (c. 1703). 

Van Nost the Elder  moved to England the later 17th century, gaining employment with the sculptor Arnold Quellin as a foreman. After Quellin's death in 1686, Nost married his widow, and established his own sculptural works business in the Haymarket district of London.


An early 18th century cast of the Samson group attributed to John van Nost I is at Harrowden Hall (reproduced Country Life 1908, Jackson Stops 1974) and a ‘Cain and Abel, of John de Bellone, lead’ was one of the sculptures sold at Nost’s end-of-life sale in 1712 (O'Connell 1987). 


For the Elder van Nost's Samson see my post -

 https://bathartandarchitecture.blogspot.com/2025/03/samson-slaying-philistine-aka-cain-and.html

After his death John van Nost's moulds were reused by his cousin John Nost II (d.1729) and later (probably in collaboration) by the firm’s apprentice/assistant, Andrew Carpenter (Carpentiere) (c. 1677-1737), as a Cain and Abel was sent by Nost II to Hopetoun House in 1718, whilst the Chiswick House cast of c. 1725 (which is now at Chatsworth) and the Stowe cast (installed by 1738; sold in 1922, now at Trent Park) are attributed to Carpenter (Bevington 1994, p. 114).


Certainly Carpenter produced copies of Giambologna’s group because a Cain and Abel is  recorded on the price list sent to Charles Howard, 3rd Earl of Carlisle (1669-1738), in 1723 (see - A Biographical Dictionary of Sculptors in Britain, 1660-1851, Yale pub. 2009 ‘Andrew Carpenter’). 


The sculpture appears again in the repertoire of John Cheere, Carpenter’s successor, who supplied a Cain and Abel made from Nost or Carpenter moulds to Portugal in 1755-6 as part of a massive commission for Queluz Palace (Neto and Grillo 2006, pp. 5-18). 



Henry Cheere (1703 – 81) and his younger brother John Cheere (1709 – 87) took over the yard of Anthony ‘Noast’ Nost at Hyde Park Corner in 1737 in what became Portugal Row, Piccadilly,  Henry Cheere’s workshops were in Westminster and quite separate from the Hyde Park Corner site which appears to have been occupied solely by John Cheere and his workshop.

Other sculptors in this growing centre for the trade included Thomas Carter I, William Collins, Richard Dickinson and Thomas Manning. 

Andrew Carpenter had ceased producing lead figures in the previous year and it seems likely that Cheere acquired some of his early stock and moulds from Carpenter’s sale, for, like Carpenter, he later marketed figures of a Blackamoor with a Sundial, the Borghese Gladiator and Diana with her Stag. 

After Manning’s death in 1747 John Cheere took over two of his yards.


Several casts of Cheere's Samson and the Philistine still exists, along with other lead figures at Seaton Delaval (NT 1276673), Wimpole (NT 207395), Drayton House (reproduced Tipping 1912), Southill Park (bought by Samuel Whitbread at Cheere’s estate sale, 1812; reproduced Hussey 1930) and the Yale Center for British Art (inv.no. B2012.3; previously with Tomasso Brothers).


..........................

The Chatsworth Samson and the Philistine.

It has been stated that the first recorded lead replica of the group described as Cain and Abel was supplied to Chatsworth in 1691, possibly by Richard Osgood of Hyde Park Corner (fl. 1691 d,1724) who is known to have produced a version, along with statues of Mars and Minerva - I suspect that this isn't true.  


Is it a coincidence that Richard Osgood supplied Thomas Belasyse, Lord Fauconberg at Sutton Court, Chiswick (later Chiswick House) with a Cain and Abel for which he was paid £42 in 1695? - this version has supposedly disappeared.


Richard Osgood went, after Fauconberg’s death, to repair and paint them) for his house Sutton Court (later known as Chiswick House, which was acquired by Lord Burlington in 1726). 

Amongst the Fauconberg papers is Arthur Palmer’s Account Book. Palmer was Fauconberg’s steward and kept an account of all expenditure on his Chiswick property – he spent £42 on statuary.


There is the version of Samson and the Philistine in a painting at Chatworth of the garden at Chiswick House by Pieter Rysbrack of 1728.

John Nost the Elder (d.1710) also supplied leadwork to Chatsworth and must have known the original marble sculpture because of his commissions for Buckingham House (c. 1703). 

According to the recent book by David Jacques: Chiswick House Gardens, 300 years of creation and re-creation, published in 2022, the following statues are at Chatsworth, were removed from Chiswick in the pre-lease period by the 8th Duke of Devonshire (d. 1908). Cain and Abel, aVenus de Medici (from the Rosary) 12 terms (5 x Guelfi, 1729, 7 bibbed?) and 12 stone stools ‘The boar and the wolf’ a goat and several cement vases



The Chatsworth Samson Slaying the Philistine by Richard Osgood.

circa 1695.

Formerly at Chiswick removed in and now at Chatsworth.





















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Chiswick House.

Pieter Rysbrack.

1727.


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The Engraving pub. Carrington Bowles after Rysbrack.










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Richard Osgood of Hyde Park Corner. Some notes.

Info here predominantly from Biographical dictionary.. Pub Yale 2009 and website.

The first record of Osgood’s work dates from 1691, when he supplied two heads for Kensington Palace (15). His name subsequently appears in the accounts of several country estates and royal palaces as the provider of a considerable amount of lead and other metal work.

He must have made a good living prior to 1691 for on 1 January 1689, in partnership with Huntley Bigg, a scrivener, (Bigg was involved with water supply from the Thames) he bought 30 acres of land in Alkham, Kent from Mathias Shore of St Martin-in-the-Fields.


In 1694 Osgood sent off statues for Sir Roger Hill at Denham Place, Bucks (2, 25). These do not appear to have survived but a topographical sketch of Denham shows several statues in situ, which may well be his work (repr Harris 1957-8, 192). Statue of Neptune and a statue of Hercules.

 

In 1700 Osgood was employed in mending statues at Hampton Court and his bill gives an insight into the practice of restoration at that time. He was paid £43 ‘for casting of new feet and part of ye legs of copper to the great Hercules’ and another £40 ‘for casting a large piece of drapery of the great statue of Antineous and making good what was wanting of ye legs...’ He also provided ‘two new arms of copper and the great part of the drapery and a new quiver of arrows for the Diana that stands in the Quadrangle Court and burning altogether and mending several other parts. For rifling and cleaning the figure with aquafort to make it look bright all alike’ (TNA WORK 5/51 fol 506).

 In 1709 he was responsible for further repairs at Hampton Court, supplying ‘two new wings for the statue of Victory and two new trumpets for the statue of Fame’.

In 1715 he was ordered ‘to model and cast in hard metal two large sea-horses and two large Tritons to spout the water in the great bason’ in Bushey Park (Gunnis 1968, 285, incorrectly cites PRO AO1.2447).

Osgood’s premises were at Hyde Park Corner, close to the lead manufacturers John Nost I, Edward Hurst and Josias Iback.

He collaborated with Nost at least once. The statues sent to Knole in 1697 were billed by Osgood but possibly supplied by Nost (6-8, 18) and in 1701 he certainly collaborated with Nost on a large order for twenty-four lead urns for Hampton Court (20) and he appears to have worked in partnership with another neighbour, the ironsmith Jean Tijou, at Sutton Court (13).

 

He was rated on three houses in Portugal Row (now Picadilly) in 1697, two at £12 and one at £30. His premises were visited in 1703 by the architect William Winde, who was attempting to find a statue for the garden of Lady Mary Bridgwater. Winde reported that he had been to ‘Mr Nostes’ and ‘Mr Ansgood’ and that the latter ‘has the best leaden figures ... very good pieces with fine mantel or drapery caste very loosely ... they are moderne’ (Winde/Bridgeman).

...........................


Treasury Papers. Vol.  CCXXXLX - 29th March 1722

 Petition of Ric hard Osgood, statuary to the  Lords of the Treasury

 Was employed by the Office of Works to model and cast in hard mettle, two large sea horses, and two large tritons, to spout the water in the great bason or fountain in Bushey Park, at Hampton Court, the bills for which were entered and passed for £1801.

The figures were set up and finished eight or nine months after the King's Accession to play the water against the King's coming to Hampton Court, but the bills remain unpaid to this day.

29th March 1722. To be paid £180" 1 page.

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MGS

Literary References: Harris 1957-8, 193-7; Gunnis 1968, 284-5; Davis 1991 (1), 34, 42, 52

Archival References: ‘large Caesar’s head for the Guard-room, 1691’, TNA WORK E.351/1347 fol 9; Lincs RO Jarvis I/D/2/14; WCA; Poor Rate 1697, F1232; Highways Rate 1722 F5550; Poor Rate 1733-1737, C118-C127; GPC

Will: PROB 11/597/26-7


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Two Statues supplied by Osgood to Knole, Kent.

The Crouching Venus and the Borghese Gladiator

1697.

A bill for 'Statuary work' dated 6th September 1697, from the sculptor Richard Osgood, bills Charles Sackville, 6th Earl of Dorset, 'for the case for the Venus and pedestal that went to Knowell', as well as 'for the Gladiator as agreed for, for a Large stone plinth and Shield with my Lords Arms'.

 A lead statue was recorded in the Green Court in the 1706 inventory of Knole, as 'One Leaden Statue on a pedestall'. This could refer to either the 'Crouching Venus' (NT 130062) or the 'Borghese Gladiator' (NT 130066)

Two bronze casts were previously supplied by Hubert Le Sieur. The first in 1629/30 for Charles I now at Windsor Castle and and a second supplied to Wilton House in 1645 (now at Houghton, Norfolk).

A receipt dated 6 September 1697 from Richard Osgood (died c.1724) bills the Earl 'For the Gladiator as agreed for' and 'For a Large stone plinth and Shield wth my Lords Armes'.  'One Leaden Statue on a pedestall'. This could refer to either the Crouching Venus (NT 130062) or the Borghese Gladiator (NT 130066).

The 1765 inventory records two statues in the Green Court: 'two Statues in the Green-Court'.

This suggests to me that Osgood was using the original moulds made by/for Hubet Le Sieur.

.......................

Osgood in the Attingham Archives.

From the National Archive -This record is held by Shropshire Archives - Attingham Collection Reference:  112/1/2203

A Bill of Statuary Worke done for the Honble Mr. Hill. 22 August, 1712

For 6 Roman heads £6.0.0d.

 For bronzing them £3.0.0d.

 6 cartoores, 6s. each £1.16.0d.

 Total £10.16.0. Receipted Richard Osgood.

 Docketed in Hill's hand "Mr. Osgood for busts, 1712."


................................

Will of Richard Osgood,

National Archives Prob 11/597/17

 

The will of Richard Osgood of St Martin-in-the-Fields was proved in April 1724, and though there is no mention of the profession of the deceased in the document, it is likely that this is the sculptor. He left his ‘little house’ at Clargis Street in the ‘high road leading to Piccadilly’ to his daughter Elizabeth Osgood, and another property on Hyde Park Corner to his wife Anne, who also received houses in Knightsbridge, Chelmsford and Much Haddon. These properties continued in family possession until 1737.

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to be continued...................













Wednesday, 26 February 2025

The van Spangens.

 

Some Notes - in preparation.

The van Spangens - a  family of Masons and Sculptors.

The family appears to have operated in London between 1677 and 1757.


Sometime in the 1790's a Nicholas van Spangen, London merchant formerly of Altona appears as a manufacturer of artificial Stone until about 1825, but it is not clear if there is a connection if any with the earlier van Spangens.

.............


Synchronicity.

This essay resulted from two separate strands of research - 

The first into the apprenticeship of John Cheere with Henry Crofts - mason, d.1727.


At least one of the Cheere's families kinsmen was a haberdasher and John’s name appeared in the Apprenticeship Books in August 1711, when he was indented to another haberdasher, the mason Henry Crofts. 

He must have had training as a sculptor, perhaps in Henry Croft workshop and evidently acquired a sound knowledge of casting and mould-making techniques.

The professions of Haberdasher and Stone Mason are not mutually exclusive - 


and the second - a request to discover more information about the artificial stone manufacturer Felix Austin fl 1817 -72 who indented a life size composition stone cast of the Hound of the Alcibides dated 1826 in a private garden in Gloucestershire.


................

The van Spangens Sculptors in the 17th and 18th Centuries.

Richard van Spangen I - fl. 1677. ( b.c 1652 - 1702).  He was described as of St Brides, London, Carver, aged about 25 when he married Martha Garland on 18 September 1677.

..................


I could not have got very far with this without the on going input of David Beattie

I offer grateful thanks to him for patiently answering my enquires.



Richard van Spangen III's largest known commission is the monument to Alderman Arthur Winsley , a full-length reclining portrait statue of a Colchester cloth merchant and philanthropist, seen turning thoughtfully away from a book imploring the viewer to ‘Go and do likewise’ (the iconography was suggested by Winsley himself in his will).

It was until recently deemed to be the work of Rysbrack but David Beatties research goes along way to clarifying the matter.


David Beattie’s booklet of 2003 not only connects him with the Winsley monument, based on the faculty, contract and receipt to be found in the Essex Record Office, it also considerably expands on the little that is known about Van Spangen’s life and career, including the important fact that he was apprenticed to Samuel Fulkes ( d.1714), one of the leading masons of the time: amongst other appointments Fulkes was ‘overseer of the masons’ for the building of St Paul’s Cathedral in London.


Image of the Winsley Monument at Colchester below from.

Essex Society for Archaeology and History Newsletter of Summer 2023 - Article by James Bettley

https://www.esah1852.org.uk/library/files/newsletter-199-summer-2022-2392615216.pdf



Biography of Richard van Spangen II. 

from  https://gunnis.henry-moore.org/henrymoore/sculptor/browserecord.php?-action=browse&-recid=2529


A Mason and Haberdasher of Camberwell, Surrey. He was the son of Richard Van Spangen and was apprenticed to Samuel Fulkes, of the Haberdashers Company, for seven years on 30 April 1703.

 He married Ann Fisher on 10 October 1723 at St Giles Church in Camberwell; their son, another Richard Van Spangen, was apprenticed to the Haberdashers on 8 May 1741, although he, like his father, became a stonemason.

It should be noted that Haberdasher and (stone) Mason were not mutually exclusive



In 1728 Richard van Spangen subscribed to James Gibbs’s Book of Architecture and the following year carved a font to Gibbs’s design (3). This was commissioned by a Mr Hume whose memorandum reads ‘Sept 1729 I agreed with Mr Van Spangen to make me a font to the dimensions and form of the draught made by Mr Gibbs architect. The Bason and pedestal to be of the best white veined marble. The plinth of black marble vein’d with gold, and the step of Portland stone. The whole to be perforated with a brass stop-cock to carry off the water into a cistern below, and to be set up in Dulwich College Chapel’ (Young 1889, 2, 346).

He is likely to be the ‘Mr Spangor’ who provided the monument for Lord Trevor, commissioned by the 3rd Baron Trevor (1). It has an armorial shield with helm, crest and supporters, and a cushion of white marble supporting the baron’s coronet. The Rev Benjamin Rogers noted in his diary ‘Some of the marble cost Mr. Spangor the Statuary in the block in Italy 18s. per foot, which stood him in 26s. per foot when brought to London, this was black with yellow veins’ (Harvey 1872-8, 68). It was completed on 25 October 1732. His largest known commission is the monument to Alderman Arthur Winsley (2), a full-length reclining portrait statue of a Colchester cloth merchant and philanthropist, seen turning thoughtfully away from a book imploring the viewer to ‘Go and do likewise’ (the iconography was suggested by Winsley himself in his will). 

The work was only recently identified as Van Spangen’s from a contract in Essex Record Office (Beattie 2023), and the scale of the work suggests that he was a more substantial sculptor than might be assumed from his few currently known works.

In 1747 he was the principal beneficiary in the will of his ‘only brother,’ John Van Spangen of St James, Westminster, who left him all his money, chattels and household goods (PROB 11/757/96 proved 5 October 1747). 

There was a sale of a collection of paintings by John Van Spangen, ‘late of Poland Street,’ soon after, on 10 February 1748, at Cock’s sale rooms. The timing suggests that this well-known art collector was Spangen’s brother. The collection consisted mainly of works bought by Van Spangen in Holland, including notable works by Rembrandt. It also included a number of ivories by Francois Duquesnoy (Catalogue of the Entire Collection of Curious Pictures of Mr John Van Spangen, Cock and Langford, London 10 February 1748).

The John van Spangen Sale Catalogue is available on line at - https://archive.org/details/frick-31072001958836/page/n5/mode/2up


Richard van Spangen appears to have had some association with Thomas Dunn, who names him as ‘Richard Spanger other Spangen’ of Camberwell in his will. Van Spangen acted as an executor and was left £5 and a gold mourning ring (PROB 11/747/12-15).

Ruper Gunnis possessed a letter from Van Spangen, dated 19 December 1749, addressed to a Mr Hooper of Hailsham, Sussex, enclosing three drawings for monumental tablets. The current whereabouts of this letter is unknown, but Gunnis quoted it at length. Spangen wrote ‘the enclosed sketches I have made according to your direction, the expense will be about what you mention; they are drawn to a small scale but when executed will be about 8 ft. high and breadth proportionate. Materials to be of the best white and Veined and statuary marble’. It continues, ‘the inscription to be engraved and painted black, and the coat of arms in proper colours and executed in a workmanlike manner’. It is not known if Mr Hooper ever ordered from one of these designs and there is no sign of any work resembling them in Hailsham church.

Van Spangen was buried on 8 February at St Giles’ Camberwell and, unusually, was interred at the same time as his wife, who seems to have died at the same time. 

His will, drafted in 1748, made Ann his sole heir, but it was proved on 14 February 1757 after her death with her heir, Thomas Metcalfe, acting as sole executor.


.............................


Correspondence with David Beattie.

"Ian Stone tells me that Henry Crofts was not a member of the Masons’ Company. I have discovered that one Henry Crofts was apprenticed to Samuel Fulkes, Haberdasher, on 20 May 1680. 

Ian Stone tells me that Henry Crofts was living at Samuel Fulkes’ house in Fetter Lane in 1694. 

By the end of the seventeenth century the guild system was breaking down. The archivist of the Haberdashers’ Company has told me that by the eighteenth century that Company had lost all its links with the trade of haberdashery. 

My own Company, the Masons, resented the fact that so many masons and carvers belonged to other, probably wealthier, guilds and in 1694 obtained an Act of Common Council which required all masons who were free of other Companies to join the Masons. Hence their inquiry into Crofts’ whereabouts. 

Between 1695 and 1717 we managed to get 36 men turned over, of whom at least 12 were Haberdashers. 

Fulkes was listed as a silver spinner in the Haberdashers’ records, but was in fact one of the leading mason contractors in London. 

He did a lot of work on St Paul’s and other City churches after the Great Fire and was for a time Overseer of the masons’ work at St Paul’s. Richard van Spangen (sr) was apprenticed to Samuel Fulkes on 30 April 1703. 

He (Van Spangen and Crofts) were therefore fellow apprentices of the same master. Evidently this created a strong bond, even though Crofts was the senior by 23 years. They probably worked on St Paul’s together.

 

 

 

As Crofts’ will shows, Richard Van Spangen Sr (the sculptor) was one of his executors and was recompensed accordingly. I am intrigued by the fact that Crofts made so many bequests to his son Richard jr, even though the son was almost certainly newly born at the time that the will was made in 1727. (I have found no record yet of Richard Jr’s baptism.) These bequests were conditional on Richard Jr surviving until he was 21. Richard Jr was apprenticed to his father in the Haberdashers in 1741 and was made Freeman of that Company in 1748. 

But I think that he must have died very soon afterwards, since on 30 November 1748 his father made a will which made no mention of him but left everything to his wife. She died a few hours after him in 1757, and there was nobody to inherit the estate. 

I have been puzzled by the bequests to Richard jr. Ian Stone has suggested that Crofts might have been Richard Jr’s godfather".


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The Will of Richard van Spangen II d. c.1757. Mason and Haberdasher of Camberwell pub. 1757.

see National Arc - https://discovery.nationalarchives.gov.uk/details/r/D576366

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In his will his brother John van Spangen left of his possessions including his tools and bench to his brother Richard - PROB 11/757/96 proved 5 October 1747.

Thomas Dunn mason of Southwark d. 1746, he left to Richard van Spangen in his will a (not very) handsome bequest of £5.


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Richard van Spangen II. sometimes Spanger (d. c. 1757) of Camberwell.

The Font in Dulwich College Chapel.

1728.

In 1728 Richard van Spangen II subscribed to James Gibbs’s Book of Architecture.

Richard van Spangen made the font (designed by Gibbs) for Dulwich College in 1729 (Young’s History of Dulwich College, Vol. II, page 346). 

Dr. Gibson, then chaplain to the Archbishop of Canterbury, and subsequently Bishop of London, presented to Dulwich College the font which is still in the chapel, made by Mr. Van Spangen from a design of Mr. Gibbs, architect, and bearing the reversible Greek motto, — (Wash away sin, not the visage only.)

This was commissioned by Mr Hume whose memorandum reads ‘Sept 1729 I agreed with Mr Van Spangen to make me a font to the dimensions and form of the draught made by Mr Gibbs architect. The Bason and pedestal to be of the best white veined marble. The plinth of black marble vein’d with gold, and the step of Portland stone. The whole to be perforated with a brass stop-cock to carry off the water into a cistern below, and to be set up in Dulwich College Chapel’ (Young 1889, 2, 346).


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The Monument to Lord Trevor.

In the Dynevor Chapel, St Owens, Bromham Park, Bedfordshire.

1732.

Richard van Spangen.


He is almost certainly the ‘Mr Spangor’ who provided the monument for Lord Trevor at Bromham, commissioned by the 3rd Baron Trevor. It has an armorial shield with helm, crest and supporters, and a cushion of white marble supporting the baron’s coronet. The Rev Benjamin Rogers noted in his diary ‘Some of the marble cost Mr. Spangor the Statuary in the block in Italy 18s. per foot, which stood him in 26s. per foot when brought to London, this was black with yellow veins’ (Harvey 1872-8, 68). It was completed on 25 October 1732.

Baron Trevor like his father he was a Fellow of the Royal Society. He was MP, as a whig, for Woodstock [Oxfordshire] from 1746 to 1753. He married Elizabeth, daughter of Sir Richard Steele, on 30th May 1732. The 3rd Baron died on 17th September 1764 at Bath, Somerset, aged 69 and was buried at Bromham where his monument may be seen in the north aisle.

Images below from -

https://seearoundbritain.com/venues/st-owens-church-bromham-open-on-request-free/pictures















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Richard van Spangen and the Widdrington Monument.

in Nunnington Church. North Riding Yorkshire.

Designed by and inscribed James Gibbs.

1743.

Notebook with the Royal Society of Antiquaries -The contents list indicates that these were communicated by Mr Van Spangen, mason of Camberwell - Nunnington North Riding, Yorkshire, to William, Lord Widdrington (d. 1743); inscription at Milton, near Peterborough, to Sir William Fitzwilliam, kt (d.1599); and inscription at Cuckfield, Sussex, to Charles Sergison (d.1732).


https://collections.sal.org.uk/sal.10.10.086





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The Monument to Arthur Winsley in St Jame's Church, Colchester, Essex.

Richard van Spangen.

1726/7.

Richard van Spangen III's largest known commission is the monument to Alderman Arthur Winsley , a full-length reclining portrait statue of a Colchester cloth merchant and philanthropist, seen turning thoughtfully away from a book imploring the viewer to ‘Go and do likewise’ (the iconography was suggested by Winsley himself in his will).

It was until recently deemed to be the work of Rysbrack but David Beatties research goes along way to clarifying the matter.


David Beattie’s booklet of 2003 not only connects him with the Winsley monument, based on the faculty, contract and receipt to be found in the Essex Record Office, it also considerably expands on the little that is known about Van Spangen’s life and career, including the important fact that he was apprenticed to Samuel Fulkes ( d.1714), one of the leading masons of the time: amongst other appointments Fulkes was ‘overseer of the masons’ for the building of St Paul’s Cathedral in London.



Image of the Winsley Monument at Colchester below from.

Essex Society for Archaeology and History Newsletter of Summer 2023 - Article by James Bettley

https://www.esah1852.org.uk/library/files/newsletter-199-summer-2022-2392615216.pdf




Biographical Dictionary of Sculptors pub yale 2009. notes
.................

The Will of Thomas Bates d. 1741.

Source: Prerogative Court of Canterbury, Probate 17 Apr 1741.

Thomas Bates of East Greenwich, gardener, will dated 10 Aug 1738. 'good for nothing' sister Elizabeth Rogers, wife Alice, executrix   - witnesses Richard Fenn - Elizabeth Phillips.

Codicil dated 19 Mar 1740  - witnesses Mary Evans - Rich'd Van Spangen.

...........................


The other van Spangen!

The development of 18th Century Artificial Stone has long been an interest of mine.

I acquired my first piece of Coade (a Laughing Philosopher keystone) in 1979.


Nicholas van Spangen. fl. 1790's - 1828.

Described as an Altona (Hamburg) merchant in the 1790's.

......................

Was Nicholas van Spangen originally employed by Coade?




Messrs van Spangen & Co.




The Kentish Weekly Post or Canterbury Journal -  in 1801 and Friday 08 January 1802 notes Nicholas van Spangen, Merchants at Wells St, Goodman's Fields, East London.

The London Gazette in 1804 mentions his Bankruptcy of 29 Nov. 1799 and states he is late of Wells Street.

Later of near the Globe at Mile End, East London.




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The Statues of Faith Hope and Charity by Nicholas van Spangen.

The Royal Cumberland Freemasons School for Girls, Westminster Road, St Georges, Southwark.
It is clear that Nicholas van Spangen had strong connections with Freemasonary which would explain his connection with the Freemasons Girls School School at Southwark


Extract from History and Survey of London pub. 1806.








By 1795, the School had left Somers Town (just north of the New Road now Euston Road) and moved to St George’s Fields, Southwark. It had outgrown this building and moved tyo Clapham in 1843.



The Statues of Faith Hope and Charity by van Spangen.

Presented to the School in 1801.











Royal Freemasons' School for female children, London. 

Illustration above Published in the Illustrated London News, 1843.

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A late Victorian / Edwardian Illustration.




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The Building Prior to the added Embellishments on the Front.

Engraving from the European Magazine 1801.

Image below from the British Museum.







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Nicholas van Spangen.fl. 1790's - 1828.

The Kentish Weekly Post or Canterbury Journal -  in 1801 and Friday 08 January 1802 notes Nicholas van Spangen, Merchants at Wells St, Goodman's Fields, East London.

The London Gazette in 1804 mentions his Bankruptcy of 29 Nov. 1799 and states he is late of Wells Street.

Later of near the Globe at Mile End, East London.


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The Later Partnership of van Spangen and Powell.


 Felix Austin (fl. 1820s-1850s) acquired Van Spangen and Powell, manufacturers of artificial stone and also acquired his moulds in about 1828.

Felix Austin was at New Road, now Euston Road, Regent’s Park, the business later became  Austin and Seeley. 

Austin and Seeley specialised in cement based garden ornaments, was still in existence in 1872.

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The Statue of Charity by Nicholas van Spangen and Powell of Mile End.

Hackney Museum.

I am assuming all the references below refer to the same statue - it might be coincidence but the dates suggest otherwise.

Presented to The Royal Cumberland Freemasons School for Girls in 1801.

and removed in 1843 when the school moved to Clapham.

......

The statue was later in a niche on St Leonard’s Parochial Schools in Kingsland Road, Shoreditch (illustrated below).

The Drawing in the Victoria and Albert Museum by Allen? below is dated 1845.

The Kingsland Road building itself had a plaque recording its rebuilding in 1802.

This building was demolished and rebuilt again in 1887.

https://collections.vam.ac.uk/item/O767580/charity-school-kingsland-street-hoxton-drawing-allen/





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The Statue at Hornchurch, Essex

c. 1909/10.

The Shoreditch Guardians of the Poor opened Hornchurch Cottage Homes in 1889. They continued in use as children's homes until 1984  - a full 95 years of residential childcare.

The photographs below show the statue at Hornchurch.



images below from - https://www.workhouses.org.uk/Shoreditch/










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Image below from

https://www.facebook.com/hornchurch.cottagehomes/





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The Photographs below taken in 1978.

Described as Tower Hamlets Children's Home, Hornchurch Road, Romford: front elevation.

Images courtesy London Picture Archive - used with permission.


https://www.londonpicturearchive.org.uk/quick-search?q=Hornchurch%20Childrens%20Home&WINID=1750687371332













https://www.landofthefanns.org/story/40-hornchurch-cottage-homes-for-children/

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Gone!





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This much travelled Statue of Charity by Nicholas van Spangen is now in Hackney Museum.


https://slightlyweird.com/2020/10/28/a-visit-to-the-hackney-museum/

























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Nicholas van Spangen and Freemasonry.


From Ars Quatuor Coronatorum: Being the Transactions of the Lodge ..., Volume 23.