his grandfather was actually John Greenway, born 1720, who married Mary Tripp, a member of a family also well-known round the outskirts of Bristol.22 This also explains how John Tripp Greenway, one of Francis Greenway’s brothers, came to be so named.
On 28 March 1792, ‘Francis Grinway [sic] son of Francis Grinway [sic] of Downend, County of Gloucester, [was] put to William Paty, Architect, and Sarah his wife for seven years. Friends to find apparel and washing’
William Paty (1758-1800) was the son of Thomas Paty (1718-1789), a Bristol mason, statuary and architect, described by Walter Ison, as ‘perhaps the most talented member of this family’.
Thomas Paty had been called in by Bath Corporation to arbitrate in the dispute about the plan to be used for the building of the new Bath Guildhall, in 1775. His son, William, was the first Bristol architect to be trained in London at the Royal Academy architectural schools. He then worked in partnership with his brother and father in Bristol, from 1777. Like his father, he was an extremely accomplished statuary, and the effect of his London training began to show in his architectural work in the 1780s, in a highly accomplished Adamesque manner. Work by him included Blaise Castle House, Henbury, in 1795 (described as remarkably forward-looking, and possibly influenced by Humphry Repton), for John Scandrett Harford the Elder (1754-1815), a member of the wealthy Quaker family of Bristol merchants and bankers.
For Francis Greenway, Paty’s influence and training would have been invaluable; it is clear that Greenway was an apt pupil.
He must have completed his seven-year apprenticeship in 1799, the year before his master William Paty died, when the business was taken over by James Foster the Elder (1748-1823), who had also been a pupil and apprentice of William Paty.
Shortly after his marriage in 1804, Greenway went into business with his two brothers, Olive Greenway and John Tripp Greenway, offering the services advertised in the Bristol Gazette in 1805:
“All orders for marble monuments, Chimney Pieces, and every kind of ornamental stone work shall be carefully attended to, and executed in the most artist-like manner.”
In 1806 he designed the hotel and assembly rooms in the Mall at Clifton, which his brothers contracted to build. During the same period the brothers were buying unfinished houses in Clifton in a speculative capacity, which they completed and then sold.
In 1809 the brothers became bankrupt and the assembly rooms were completed by Joseph Kay.
It appears that for the next four years, the business ran smoothly until April, 1809, when legal questions were raised regarding both the family business and some of its present and past contracts.
One month later, the word “bankruptcy”
appeared in the paper, and Greenway’s career became jeopardized. As a result,
the Greenways’ possessions were put up for auction in order to satisfy their
creditors. The precise reasons for the legal actions and subsequent bankruptcy
have been lost in local legend and unclear newspaper reports regarding a
long-standing issue of water rights in and around Bath (where construction of
buildings for the use of visitors who wanted to take advantage of the healing
waters was common). Greenway tried to show how he had been fooled by
speculators and false promises, but his attempt proved fruitless.
Despite this setback, Greenway was still working as an architect in 1810.
Problems arose regarding a contract that Greenway had made with Colonel Richard Doolan, for whom he was doing some work. Greenway swore that the colonel had authorized an additional £250 for some extra work Greenway had provided. However, the contract was lost and the colonel denied the charge. Greenway eventually produced the lost contract. In the court proceedings that followed, it was proved that Greenway had forged the contract, and Greenway was held at Newgate prison for sentencing.
Three months later, in March of 1812, Greenway found himself in the dock at the Bristol Assizes. He pleaded guilty to the charges and was sentenced to death by hanging He still had some influential friends, and they managed to get his sentence reduced first to lifelong exile in Australia (which was then a penal colony) and later commuted to transportation to the colony for a term of fourteen years.
