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 Nicholas van Spangen appears as a manufacturer of artificial Stone until about 1825.
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Synchronicity.
This essay resulted from two separate strands of research -
The first into the apprenticeship of John Cheere with Henry Crofts - mason, d.1727.
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.
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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.
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The Will of Richard van Spangen 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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Richard van Spangen II. (d. c. 1757)
The Font in Dulwich College Chapel.
1728.
In 1728van Spangen 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 the
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 James 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).
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.
https://www.esah1852.org.uk/library/files/newsletter-199-summer-2022-2392615216.pdf
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 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 van Spangen and Powell.
Van Spangen and
Powell – Felix Austin (fl. 1820s-1850s) acquired Van Spangen and Powell,
manufacturers of artificial stone about 1828 and also acquired his moulds. Austin was at New Road,
Regent’s Park, the business later became Austin
and Seeley. The firm, which specialised in garden ornaments, was still in
existence in 1872.
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Ars Quatuor
Coronatorum: Being the Transactions of the Lodge ..., Volume 23.
