Monday, 8 September 2025

Monument in St Lawrence Parish Church Ludlow and another at All Saints Honington. and two further monuments derived from the same basic design



 updated 10 December 2025



The slightly macabre marble monument to Theophilus Salway (b. c 1699, d. 1760), St Lawrence Parish Church, Ludlow. 

The Honington Monument to Joseph Townsend MP (1704 - 1763) of Honington Hall. Warwickshire. erected after 1763.

The Monument to Elizabeth Townsend, Thorpe, Surrey after 1755.

The Monument to Edward Hunter. All Saints, Maidstone Kent. after 1757


George Gordon, St Nicholas,  Rochester, d. 1739 but erected later. I cannot currently locate any photographs


The Monument to Theophilus Salway.

Salway was a director of the Bank of England -see -The London Magazine; Or, Gentleman's Monthly Intelligencer, 1741 page 203 and 1752 Volume 21, page 190.

Superb quality carving. 

The question here must be why was the child depicted with the elongated skull, which appears in an even more exaggerated form on the Honington Monument?

 Designed and carved in the workshop of Sir Robert Taylor - 

After1760. 


In Memory of

THEOPHILUS SALWEY ESQR

who was the eldest Son of EDWARD SALWEY ESQR

a Younger Son of Major RICHARD SALWEY

who in the last Century

sacrifiz’d all and every thing in his Power

in Suppport of publick Liberty and in Opposition to Arbitrary Power

the said THEOPHILUS SALWEY married

MARY the Daughter and Heiress of

ROBERT DENNET of Walthamstow in the County of Essex Esqr.

but left no Issue by her.

Obiit the 28th. of April 1760 Aetat, 61

Pro Rege Saepe Pro Republica Semper


There is a design in a book of drawings of monuments by Taylor in the Taylorian Institute in Oxford (see below)- which suggests that it is perhaps a preliminary design see my web post - 

https://bathartandarchitecture.blogspot.com/2025/06/sir-robert-taylors-designs-for-church.html


The design is more or less repeated with some variations on the monument to Joseph Townsend at All Saints Church Honington, Warwickshire.

The not great photographs of the Honington monument here lifted from - 

 https://www.flickr.com/photos/amthomson/20595901041/in/photostream/

Used here until I can find time to visit myself 




















The Honington Monument Joseph Townsend MP (1704 - 1763) of Honington Hall. Warwickshire.

after 1763

Sir Henry Parker of Honington Hall (built 1668) died in 1713 and was succeeded by his grandson, who in 1737 sold the estate to Joseph Townsend. 

Townsend sat as an MP, and in 1744 married Judith Gore, the co-heiress of John Gore, MP for Grimsby. Following this marriage substantial alterations were made to the fronts and interior of the house. 

The series of busts of Roman emperors on the fronts of the house shown in a drawing by Thomas Robins of 1759 (V and A) were probably added by Townsend.


Formal gardens illustrated in an early 18th-century engraving by Samuel and Nathaniel Buck were removed in favour of a landscape scheme with the advice of Sanderson Miller (1716-80) of Radway Grange, Warwickshire. Honington was one of a group of Warwickshire sites at which Miller advised, including Alscot Park, Arbury Hall, Farnborough Hall and Packington Hall.  The mid-18th-century landscape and the remodelled house are shown in a pair of rococo watercolours of 1759 by Thomas Robins (private collection). 

Joseph Townsend died in 1763, leaving the estate to his son, Gore Townsend, who in turn was succeeded by his son, the Rev Henry Townsend. When the Rev Henry Townsend died in 1873 his nephew, Frederick Townsend, a noted amateur botanist, inherited Honington and lived there until his death in 1905,












































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Monument to Edward Hunter.

after 1757.

All Saints, Maidstone Kent.

Images below courtesy Conway Library Photo archive.















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Monument to Elizabeth Townsend

Thorpe, Surrey.

after 1755.

Images below courtesy Conway Library Photo archive.

















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The Robert Taylor Design.

From a group of drawings in the Taylorian Institute Oxford.
I am grateful to all at the Taylorian who made my visit and the photography possible.

see my post







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Of tangential interest - The Parker Monument at Honington.

Commemorates: Sir Henry Parker (died 1713), who rebuilt the church and the adjacent Honington Hall in the 1680s, and his son Hugh (died 1712).

Thomas Green of Camberwell.









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