Post in preparation.
To be added to as more information appears - I could do with some assistance from someone on the ground in Jamaica.
This is the only bust to my knowledge that has been ascribed to John Cheere with any degree certainty.
Most of the secular busts of Henry Cheere were probably not carved by him but made in his workshop or sub contracted - the bust of Hawksmoor at All Souls College Oxford comes to mind.
This is a subject that I have returned to on several occasions and will no doubt come back to in the future. We do not know what Roubiliac did until 1736 with reports in the press of his busts of Farinelli and Senesino.
There is so far no proof of later reports that Roubiliac was working for or subcontracting to Henry Cheere in his workshops at Westminster, but evidence presented here might suggest a working relationship with the Cheere brothers.
Roubiliac reused /repeated the dress on several of his busts and here we have evidence of this happening again, with the bust inscribed by John Cheere in Jamaica and the anonymous very fine lead and so far unidentified, bust in the Victoria and Albert Museum.
Much of John Cheere's early working life remains a mystery until in 1738 he acquire (along with his brother the properties of the van Nosts at Stone Bridge on the North side of what became Portugal Row and later Piccadilly, at Hyde Park Corner.
For a series of busts previously attributed to the hand of Henry Cheere but with only circumstantial evidence see my post.
https://bathartandarchitecture.blogspot.com/2021/05/addison-or-someone-else.html
For a very useful article on Church Monuments in the West Indies see -
Carving Histories: British Sculpture in the West Indies by Joan Coutu in the Journal of the Church Monuments Society Vol XII 1997 p 77.
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The Marble Bust of the Hon. James Lawes ( 1698 - 1734).
On the base of the socle the bust on the monument is inscribed .John Cheere (1709 - 87) Fecit 1737.
Halfway Tree, Kingston, Jamaica.
The St Nicholas Chapel (western wall) boasts an elaborate memorial to the Hon. James Lawes, son of Sir Nicholas Lawes, (d. 1731 in Jamaica) who was Governor of Jamaica (1718 - 22) and benefactor who had also donated the intricate brass candelabrum to the church in 1706.
This bust is very obviously closely related to the anonymous lead bust formerly thought to be of Hogarth in the V and A.
It is most likely that the bust had been carved whilst Lawes was in England and was later fitted on to the monument
The Hon. James Lawes was only thirty-six years old when he died in 1733, and his widow, Elizabeth née Gibbons contracted John Cheere to provide the monument to him.
James Lawes was born in Jamaica 26/02/1697. Member of Assembly 1721-1722, Member of Council 1725, Lieutenant Governor. Buried 29/12/1733.
He had no legitimate children. Inherited Snow Hill and Mount James as well as a moity of Swallowfield, Temple Hall and Townswell estates from his father. He married Elizabeth, only daughter and heir of William Gibbons of Vere, Jamaica in 1720.
She
inherited her husband's estates on his death and remarried in 1742 to William,
8th Earl of Home.
The will of James Lawes was proved in Jamaica in 1733.
John Cheere also provided the monument to her mother Deborah Gibbons at St Peters, Vere Jamaica.(see image below)
Elizabeth Lawes nee Gibbons - later Countess of Home (née Gibbons; 1703/04 – 15 January 1784) was a Jamaican-English heiress.
She was born in
Jamaica in 1703 or 1704 She was the only
child and heir of William Gibbons and his wife Deborah. William Gibbons was a
West Indies merchant and one of the island's original English planters. Little
otherwise is known of him.
James Lawes was perhaps the most eligible bachelor in
Jamaica. He was often in dispute with the island's governor Henry Bentinck, 1st
Duke of Portland (his father's successor to the post) and would not allow his
wife to pay her respects.
The Lawes eventually moved to London, where he received the
post of lieutenant governor for the island. However, Lawes died in 1734,
several months before he could officially begin the position. They had no
children.
Elizabeth inherited a great fortune upon James' death, possessing a jointure of £7,000 and 5,287 acres. She also owned many prosperous Jamaican estates inherited from her father.
She commissioned English sculptor John Cheere to construct the monument in her husband's honour.
The resulting sculpture, the
largest yet to be shipped to the West Indies, was placed in Lawes' home parish church of Saint Andrew.
Already rich from her merchant father, she married James Lawes, the eligible son of Jamaica's governor, in 1720.
They moved to London, and his death in 1734 left her a wealthy widow. Elizabeth married the spendthrift William Home, 8th Earl of Home in late 1742.
William Home abandoned her soon
after and she spent her next years living an extravagant lifestyle; Elizabeth
earned the nickname "Queen of Hell" for her "irascible" behaviour
and lavish parties.
For a useful biography of the Countess of Home see -
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elizabeth_Home,_Countess_of_Home#CITEREFPocockCook2011
see also for her Jamaica holdings and slave ownership -
https://www.ucl.ac.uk/lbs/person/view/2146649547
For Monuments in the Colonies see - Persuasion and
Propaganda: Monuments and the Eighteenth-Century British Empire by Joan Coutu, pub. Mc Gill, Queens University Press. 2006.
I do not have a copy.
....................
The Images below Courtesy the Conway Library, Courtauld Gallery Website.
Including pedestal height: 75.5cm.
Width: 47.1cm
Resident slave-owner and agent of the South Sea Co. in
Jamaica, party to public divorce proceedings in Jamaica in 1741.
Owner of 413 acres and 104 enslaved people in St Andrew,
Jamaica, in 1753.
Edward Manning was listed in the Jamaican Quit Rent books
for 1754 as the owner of 750 acres of land in St Andrew, 480 acres in St
Thomas-in-the-East, 1500 acres in Portland, 3200 acres in Clarendon and 80
acres in Vere, total 6010 acres.
"M.A. Kingston 1744, '45, '49, '52. Portland 1754, '55,
'56. Speaker 1756. Called to the Council 1756. Died K.P.C. 1756, December 6;
aged 46 years. He was married to the sister of Sir Henry Moore, but they were
divorced; Ballard Beckford was the Co-Respondent."
Anna Catalina, daughter of Elizabeth Pinnock, a free mulatto
woman, by the Honble Edward Manning esq, was born 13/5/1755 and bapt. at
Kingston 24/11/1755. Perhaps the mother was Elizabeth Pinnock [no racial
description given] whose daughter Sarah was baptised in St Andrew 22/12/1749
[no paternity mentioned].
Will of Edward Manning of Kingston, Jamaica proved
05/05/1758. After monetary legacies to his family in England and providing for
'a free mulatto' woman Elizabeth Pinnock and Elizabeth's children, he left his
estates 1/4 to his nephew Sabine Turner and 3/4 to Sarah and Mary Lawrence, the
daughters of his sister Sarah Baxter.
Edward Manning of Kingston, Esquire. Estate probated in
Jamaica in 1758. Slave-ownership at probate: 609 of whom 327 were listed as
male and 282 as female. 132 were listed as boys, girls or children. Total value
of estate at probate: £67,297.54 Jamaican currency of which £25,322.18 currency
was the value of enslaved people. Estate valuation included £15.39 currency
cash, £33,218.13 currency debts and £1,243.56 currency plate.
For the indiscretions of both Manning and his wife in Jamaica see -
https://etheses.whiterose.ac.uk/id/eprint/27514/2/799860_vol_2.pdf
for more on Manning and the iniquitous Slave Trade in Jamaica see -
http://www.barrow-lousada.org/PDFdocs/Kingston%20loan%20books.pdf
see also
A 1748 “Petition of Negro Slaves” and the Local Politics of Slavery in Jamaica by James Roberstonin the The William and Mary Quarterly, Vol. 67, No. 2 (April 2010), pp. 319-346 (28 pages).
available on line through jstor
The Monument to Edward Manning (1710 -56).
Previously suggested as by Roubiliac.
Currently attributed to Sir Robert Taylor (1714 - 88) which would seem most likely.
Taylor seems to have specialised in relief portraits on his monuments.
There several Taylor monuments - Thomas Withers in Bridgetown, Barbados (damaged) d August 1750 which resembles also the monument to John Andrews in Trinity Hall Chapel, Cambridge.
Image below courtesy the Conway Library, Courtauld Gallery.
To the Memory of THOMAS WITHERS Mercht. who Died Aug. 30th 1750,
Aged 68 Years. A Man of fair Character in his Profession And unaffected Piety in his Life.
In the Dispatch of Business punctual and exact. In his Friendships hearty and sincere, In his Conversation affable and free. Charity which actually extended itself to man[y,] [A]nd readiness with a
Benevolence that reached Al[l.]
This monument was erected by his Son . . .Daniel Moore
Persuasion and Propaganda: Monuments and the
Eighteenth-Century British Empire was published in 2006.
https://photoarchive.paul-mellon-centre.ac.uk/objects/408117/barbados-museum-and-historical-society-monument-to-thomas-w?ctx=5ec3d345d520f6ce3357963a606bb7f358d4e049&idx=6
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Of Tangential Interest.
John Bacon and his Jamaican Monuments.
John Bacon’s commission to produce a statue of Admiral Lord Rodney to be located in the main square of Spanish Town Jamaica led to a further 11 requests from senior government officials and wealthy planters over the next decade. Included are 5 examples here; three from Spanish Town Cathedral and one each from Kingston Parish Church and St James's Church Montego Bay.
https://victorianweb.org/sculpture/baconsenior/jamaica.htm
List of John Bacon’s Jamaican works (from Roscoe)
Roscoe Number.
47. John
Wolmer (†1729), Funerary Monument . 1789. St.
Thomas, Kingston, Jamaica.
49. George
McFarquhar (†1786). Funerary Monument. 1791, St.
James, Montego Bay, Jamaica.
56. Dr
Fortunatus Dwarris (†1790) and his niece, Anne Neufville (†1782). Funerary Monument 1792 Kingston,
Jamaica
72. Malcolm
(†1781) and Eleanor Laing (†1747). Funerary
Monument . 1794. St. Thomas, Kingston, Jamaica.
74. Rosa
Palmer (†1790). Funerary Monument. 1794. St.
James, Montego Bay, Jamaica
82. E Prince. Funerary Monument. 1795. Port Antonio. Jamaica, WI
96. Thomas,
4th Earl and Catherine, Countess of Effingham (both †1791). Funerary Monument, 1796. Spanish
Town Cathedral, Jamaica.
105. Anne
Williamson (†1794). Funerary
Monument. 1798. Spanish Town Cathedral, Jamaica.
108. Richard
Batty (†1796). Funerary Monument. 1798. Spanish
Town Cathedral, Jamaica.
110. Francis
Rigby Brodbelt (†1795). Funerary Monument. 1799. Spanish
Town Cathedral, Jamaica.
112. Mary Carr
(†1798). Funerary Monument ? 1799. Kingston
Cathedral, Jamaica.
150. Admiral Lord
Rodney. Statue. 1786-1790. Spanish
Town, Jamaica.
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for a very good high resolution 18th century map of Jamaica see -
