Two Busts of Samuel Tufnell MP (1682 - 1758). Part 1

  

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Samuel Tufnell (1682 - 1758) - Art and Architecture.

Part 1.

The Two Busts of Samuel Tufnell, MP  (1682 - 1758).

of Langley Park (Langleys), Essex.

The Marble bust is on the monument in Holy Trinity Church, Pleshey, Essex.

Anonymous probably by a sculptor working in the workshop of Henry Cheere.

The monument to a design by Henry Cheere.

and The Plaster bust in the Moot Hall, Maldon, Essex.

Some notes on the busts, and Langleys (the family seat).

Another plaster bust is in the Town Hall, Colchester Essex.

(info with grateful thanks Victoria George, Moot Hall, Maldon)

For a good potted biog. of Samuel Tufnell see -

http://www.historyofparliamentonline.org/volume/1715-1754/member/tufnell-samuel-1682-1758

I have already posted at some length on the architecture and sculpture at the Tufnell family seat at Langley Park see -

http://english18thcenturyportraitsculpture.blogspot.com/2019/02/the-huntington-marble-bust-of-oliver.html

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Samuel Tufnell (1682 - 1758).

For another very useful source of information see -

 - https://thesignsofthetimes.com.au/32/58384.htm

Grandson of Richard Tufnell who was MP for Southwark in 1640. 

Samuel was the son of John Tufnell (Tufnaile) , brewer, of St Mary's Undershaft, London, and Monken Hadley, Middlesex, and his wife Elizabeth Jolliffe, daughter of John Jolliffe, MP, merchant and alderman of London. 

He matriculated at Merton College, Oxford in 1698. On the death of his father in 1699, he succeeded to the family estate, under the trusteeship of his uncles, Sir William Jolliffe and Sir Edward Northey. 

He was admitted to Middle Temple in 1699 and called to the bar in 1703. He undertook a Grand Tour through the Netherlands, Germany, Italy and Switzerland from 1703 to 1705.

 He became a Fellow of the Royal Society in 1709.

Samuel married Elizabeth CRESSENER, daughter of George CRESSENER of London, Esq. and Maria Anna PAYLER, on 19 Dec 1717 in Sts. Mary & Lawrence, Great Waltham, Essex, England. 

(Elizabeth CRESSENER was born est 1695 in Watling Street, St. Augustine, London, England and was buried 22 Nov 1777 in Holy Trinity, Pleshey, Essex, England.)

"Last Wednesday died in Albemarle-Street, Samuel Tufnell, Esq; of Langleys, in the County of Essex. He formerly served in Parliament for the Boroughs of Colchester and Maldon, in the same County ; and is succeeded in Estate by his eldest Son, John Joliffe Tufnell, Esq; Member for Beverley, in Yorkshire."

 Derby Mercury, 29 December 1759, p. 3

Web photographs - it has not been possible to make real comparisons with the plaster bust below but  it appears that the plaster bust has been taken from the marble.

It is dangerous to make assertions based on the appearance of the physiognomy (he was 76 when he died) but I would say that the bust shows a younger man suggesting to me that it was made some time earlier than the monument.

Drawing for the Samuel Tufnell Monument at Pleshey, from the studio of Henry Cheere

Illustrated in Designs for English Sculpture 1680 - 1860 by John Physick, V and A, 1969.

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Samuel Tufnell MP

The Plaster Bust

 Moot Hall

Maldon

H. 68 x W. 49 x D 23 cm.

Images below courtesy ART UK website see -

https://artuk.org/discover/artworks/samuel-tufnell-of-langleys-great-waltham-16821758-250870

.

To me the turned socle suggests a later date for the plaster.

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Samuel Tufnell and Elizabeth Tufnell nee Cressener and family at Antwerp?.

by Pieter Snyers (1681 - 1752)

Dated 1730.

Depicting behind John Jolliffe Tufnell b. 1720, George Forster b. 1723 and Nathaniel Payler (of Nun Monkton Yorkshire)

In the foreground Ann Marie, Mary Ann d.1790, Elizabeth Tufnell, nee Cressener, William Tufnell and Samuel Tufnell

Image from Gallica

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Samuel Tufnell II ( d.1796).

From the website of dealer Roy Precious

https://www.royprecious.co.uk/

"It has been suggested by a member of the family that this may not be Samuel Tufnell, but his grandson, also called Samuel Tufnell, who married the daughter of Wilmot-Horton" Roy Precious.

Given the clothing and wig and age I tend to agree.

Quote below from "Samuel Tufnell of Langleys 1682-1758; the Life and Times of an Essex Squire" by Francis W. Steer. pub 1960.

"At Great Waltham in the centre of Essex is the mellow brick mansion of Langleys where, over the dining room fireplace hangs the portrait of a grave-faced boy in a red coat. Two miles away, at Pleshey - a place known to all readers of Shakespeare - is a massive marble monument with the bust of an old man who died full of years and achievements.

The boy and the man are one. The portrait and the bust are both of Samuel Tufnell who bought Langleys and made it into the stately home we see today.

The portrait itself is a good, honest, no-nonsense image of the sitter...he looks directly and frankly at the viewer.

The unknown artist was clearly influenced by the work of Joseph Highmore (1692 – 1780), an artist very fashionable with the gentry at this time.

SIZE: 36 x 30.5 inches inc. frame.

PROVENANCE: Sir Robert Wilmot - Horton.

Yorkshire Private Collection.

Verso, Victorian Gothic script label: "Painting of Samuel Tufnell, esquire, of Langleys, married Elizabeth, daughter of George Cressener. The property of Sir Robert Wilmot-Horton; Artist J. Highmore."

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Langleys, Great Waltham, Essex.

Plate dedicated to John Jolliff Tufnell son of Samuel Tufnell.

Langleys was purchased from Sir Richard Everard (1683 - 1733) in 1709 by Samuel Tufnell

This late 18th century image of Langleys from Historic England Archive.