Bath, Art and Architecture: 06/28/25

Saturday, 28 June 2025

Henry Cheere and the Monuments in Winchester Cathedral.

The Monument to Bishop Richard Willis d. 1734.

Bishop of Winchester.

Inscribed H Cheere Fect.

In the South Aisle of the Nave.

Photographs here taken by the author on the 6 November 2017.

I rather wish I had paid more attention to this monument

The quality of the carving is exceptional in particular his right hand and sleeve.

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The Preparatory Drawing for the Willis Monument in the V and A.

https://collections.vam.ac.uk/item/O800171/design-cheere-henry-sir/

https://georgiangroup.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/GGJ_2015_05_Smith.pdf

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Monument to Charles Woodroffe d. 1726.

This monument is earlier than the Cheere monuments and not by him.

The Inscription in Latin: Nearby are buried Charles Woodroffe LLD, prebendary of this church and Elizabeth his most beloved wife. Dear souls, worthy to be buried with the highest honours; in as much as his serene and unwrinkled brow, his lofty and steadfast mind, his elegant and urbane manners, the severity of his theological and legal learning tempered with more pleasant studies and the charms of music, made him a great loss to his friends. Her charming appearance, humorous countenance, lively genius, well-born modesty, natural grace, her delicate virtue and her piety tempered by the sweetness of her character made her darling of her husband. He died 13th February 1726 at age 54. She died 6th September 1721 at age 33.

RB. AW put up this stone to the happy pair. [Translation from "A Selection of Latin Inscriptions at Winchester Cathedral" by Pat Wagstaff, amended.]

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Another Earlier Monument.

Peter Mews the Warrior Bishop of Winchester.

Some Drawings of Funeral Monuments presumably by Henry Cheere in the Victoria and Albert Museum.

Henry Cheere was apprenticed to a member of the Hartshorne family, probably Robert I, in December 1718.

By 1726 he had acquired two premises in St Margaret’s Lane, (later St Margaret.s Street) which ran between Old Palace Yard and New Palace Yard, Westminster, one of them a ‘shop’.

The location was convenient for the Wharfs along the Thames for the transport of stone and marble and the finished works by river and also for commissions destined for Westminster Abbey.

Within a year he was collaborating on monuments with the Flemish sculptor, Henry Scheemakers, brother of Peter who might be credited with introduceing him to Continental modelling and carving techniques.

Their most ambitious work, signed conspicuously by both sculptors, is the memorial to the Duke of Ancaster, at Edenham, Lincolnshire which has an elegant life-sized effigy of a Roman general with cropped hair, set in a grand architectural frame. The partnership lasted 7 years, ceasing when Scheemakers left England in 1733.