Coade and the Gothic. The Carlton House Candelabra and some further examples of Coade Gothic.

 

Some notes - another work in progress.

I will add more  images and information as I progress

Here is an attempt to survey some of the Coade manufactory artificial stone products in the Gothic manner.

I have touched on the subject previously -

https://bathartandarchitecture.blogspot.com/2026/02/the-coade-premises-at-narrow-wall.html

To anyone interested please forgive my scattergun approach and my sort of stream of consciousness approach to the subject - I do try and check my sources! and to provide links to my previous notes and to my sources - any mistakes are my own!

The search box on the top left of the page usually works very well - thank you google!

There are 846 posts here and a further 308 posts on my parallel blog which acts as a sort of on line filing system.

https://english18thcenturyportraitsculpture.blogspot.com/2024/09/mrs-mary-landre-figure-maker.html

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The 10 Carlton House Candelabra.

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The Huntington Gothic Candelabra.

From the set of ten originally made for the Gothic conservatory that Thomas Hopper (1776 - 1856) designed for Carlton House, the London residence of the George Prince Regent, later George IV (1762 - 1830).

Each Height: 208 cm Width: 44.5 cm Depth: 47 cm.

The torchères each held brass lamps with six burners and originally stood on black marble plinths.

Ordered by the Prince Regent from Coade & Sealy for the cast iron Gothic Conservatory at Carlton House, and delivered on 9 February 1811. 

The total cost for the set was £500. The bills in the Windsor archives show that the candelabra originally had black marble plinths, and held brass lamps with six burners each. 

Alison Kelly writes of the decoration for the conservatory by Coade and Sealy ‘In July of 1810. Some Statues were ready, “2 statues of ancient Kings and 2 do. Of Bishops and 1 statue of a Pilgrim for niches in the Conservatory.” They…seem reasonable at £96.12s.0d.

Demolished in 1827, the appearance of the magnificent interior of the conservatory survives through illustrations and written accounts which include descriptions of the other Coade stone works it contained, depicting kings, bishops and a pilgrim as well as a central fountain with eight dragons. 

Following the demolition of Carlton House in 1827, they were installed in the coffee room at Windsor Castle in 1827, eight of the ten were gilded, and they were all fitted with new oil lamps. 

Of the ten original candelabra, six went to Leeds Castle following their purchase at Christie’s on 19 November 1970.

The torchères each held brass lamps with six burners and originally stood on black marble plinths.

One was sold at Christie’s in 1989, and bought for the National Museum of Wales, Cardiff.’ (Item number NMW A 30042).

images here from - https://thehumblefabulist.com/tag/the-huntington-art-collections/

The Huntington Collection Candelabra.

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The Victoria and Albert Museum Coade Candelabra.

Very poor resolution photographs from the website

I will attempt to obtain some better images in due courdr.

Bought from Christopher Gibbs, Ltd., for £1.500, by the Central Fund, in 1980.

https://collections.vam.ac.uk/item/O8857/candelabrum-candelabrum-hopper-thomas/#object-details

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The Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge, Gothic Candelabra.

Sold to the Fitzwilliam by Thomas Coulborn & Sons

https://www.coulborn.com/

Provenance - Collection of Sir Robert Gordon Cooke MP, Athelhampton House, Dorset.

All the images below from the website of Thomas Coulborn and Sons

https://www.coulborn.com/artworks/categories/9/1581-sold-to-the-fitzwilliam-museum-cambridge-regency-coade/

https://www.bada.org/object/regency-coade-stone-torchere-coade-sealy-designed-thomas-hopper-1776-1856

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The National Museum of Wales Coade Candelabra.

very poor snaps from -

https://museum.wales/collections/online/?field0=string&value0=Coade&field1=with_images&value1=1

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There was the version purchased at Bonham's London, Lots Road Saleroom by Peter Hone from the residue of the collection of Sylvia Adams in 1996.

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Pyne, W. H. Royal Residences, London, 1818, plates I, II.

Alison Kelly notes 

Michael Grove, Sussex -  signerd dated 1816 - two rich Gothic Candelabra £81 16s 4d.

Coleorton Hall, Ashby de la Zouche signed and dated 1817 - £35 16s 1d - a rich Gothic Candlestick

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Literature.

W.H. Pyne, Royal Residences, London, 1818, plates I, II

One of the torchères is illustrated in Geoffrey de Bellaigue and Pat Kirkham, ‘George IV and the Furnishing of Windsor Castle’ in Furniture History: The Journal of the Furniture History Society, Volume VIII, 1972, p.1-34, pl.13B.

Alison Kelly, Mrs Coade’s Stone, Upton-upon-Severn, 1990, illustrated p.220

The Queen’s Gallery Carlton House: The Past Glories of George IV’s Palace, London, 1991, p.225, illus. back cover Buckingham Palace Exhibition Catalogue

Diane Bilbey and Marjorie Trusted, British Sculpture 1470- 2000. A Concise Catalogue of the Collection at the Victoria and Albert Museum, London: V&A 2002, p. 307, cat. no. 471

Celina Fox (ed.), London – World City, 1800-1840, New Haven: Yale University Press, 1992 no. 279

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A letter with sketch from Sealy to John Soane - January 1790.

Ornamental Stone Manufy/Lambeth 12 Jany 1790/Mr Sealys Compts - find herewith a/Cast from one of the Gothic niches at St George’s Chapel/Windsor for Mr Soane’s acceptance.

https://collections.soane.org/THES80437

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Soane Museum Drawing for - 

Bramley, Hampshire: St James' Church, new chapel for Mrs Brocas, 1801-3.

Copy of drawing [4]. The tracery was made by Coade and Sealy.

labelled: Iron bar, 1st, 2nd, A, B, 1, 2, 3, 4, A, B, (in Soane's hand) Mem April 28 / 1802 The whole of the Windows, Imposts / Cill completely fixed in every / respect with Cramps & Iron / bars & running with Lead, every / thing complete, exclusion of the Carriage only for One hundred Guineas To be completed in 3 months from this 27 April 1802 / Coade & Sealy, (pencil) Abt 100 Ges exclusive of Carriage / --- ---- ------ ------ (illegible) and some dimensions given; (verso, pencil): Mrs Brocas

https://collections.soane.org/THES100888

Another Soane  drawing  St James' Church, Bramley, Hampshire: new chapel for Mrs Brocas, 1801-3.

Inscribed Mrs Brocas, (in Soane's hand) At Bramley June 11 1803 / Saturday, June 10 1803 / Recd on Acct £50 / for the Coade / ---- ---- (illegible), an illegible note at bottom left and dimensions given

Signed and dated Lincolns Inn Fields 14 April 1802.

https://collections.soane.org/THES100886

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of Tangential Interest.

Pair of Coade stone Gothic Finials.

Sold recently by Arabesque Antiques

Pinnacles H 79 1/2" x W 23" x D 23" Stone Pedestals H 12" x W 17" x D 17'

signed and dated 'Coade London 1819'.

Decorated on all four sides with crockets and portrait heads, both terminating in large poppy finials, in very good condition and standing on matched composition stone pedestals.

https://www.arabesqueantiques.co.uk/artworks/9552-pair-of-very-large-coade-stone-gothic-pinnacles/

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Coade and Sealy in All Saints Church at Coleshill, Oxfordshire.

The N. wall of the sanctuary is filled from floor to ceiling by a massive, triple-arched structure (left and below right), supported on slender octagonal columns.

This monument commemorates Mark Stewart Pleydell (d. 1768) and his wife, who predeceased him by twenty-one years.  All three arches are crocketed, cusped and ogee-pointed, with the much wider central arch being double-cusped (trefoil-cusping inside septfoil-cusping!).

http://www.english-church-architecture.net/oxfordshire/coleshill/coleshill.htm

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Jack Fuller's first venture into folly building was the Coade stone summerhouse erected in 1803. It is located in the woods on the west side of Brightling Park. East Sussex.

Indented Coade and Sealey London inside the arch

https://johnmadjackfuller.homestead.com/summerhouse.html

 

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Gothic Pinnacle with the English trade.

Dimensions: Height: 46.46 in (118 cm) Width: 11.03 in (28 cm) Depth: 11.03 in (28 cm).

This pinnacle would look a lot better if the paint were removed.

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Gothic Gateway St Mary's Church at Tremadog. Gwynedd, Wales.

https://www.cbsconservation.co.uk/projects/st_marys_tremadog_gwynedd/

Some Coade Stone Church Monuments.

 

Essay in preparation.

The Memorial to Frances Brown, daughter in law of Lancelot "Capability" Brown in Coade stone at Parish Church of St Peter And St Paul, Fenstanton`. Cambridge.

 TheWife of Lancelot Brown [Jnr] Lord of the Manor and sister of Rose Fuller Esq of Rose Hill ... Sussex". She died  2 December 1792 aged 38. Couple had married in 1788 at Lausanne.

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St Mary's Church, Battersea.

The Monument to John Camden, (d. 1780), and his eldest daughter Elizabeth Neild, (d. 1791). 

 Signed by Coade Lambeth 1792.

James Neild (d.1814) goldsmith - son of James Nield of Knutsford, married, in 1778, the Elizabeth eldest daughter of John Camden of Battersea and had two sons and a daughter.

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The Victoria and Albert Museum version.

This Coade stone monument to Sir William Hillman, made by Coade and Sealy in 1800, was originally in the demolished church of St. James's, Hampstead Road, London.

Monument to Sir William Hillman (1740–93)

Commisioned bySir William Hillman’s sister, Elizabeth Walter.

The Kedermister Chapel, S Mary's Church Langley, Berkshire.

The Kedermister Chapel and its attached library, located within St. Mary’s Church in Langley, Berkshire, were established in the 1630s by Sir John Kedermister.

In 1788, Sir Robert Bateson Harvey, Bt, acquired the manor, and thus began a new dynasty, which lasted until the death of the last Lady Harvey in 1937. The first Sir Robert was Sheriff of Buckinghamshire in 1791 and his descendants provided further sheriffs in 1828 and 1900. They made the burial vault their own, and they used the chapel above for the display of family monuments. The earliest of these, for David and Elizabeth Harvey, is a Coade stone figure of a mourning woman and is dated 1791.

The screen separating the nave and the south chapel added by the Kedermister family is of Coade's artificial stone, was set up by Robert Bateson in 1792 from the designs of Henry Emlyn, who also designed the organ gallery and screen in St.George's Chapel, Windsor, which are built of the same material.

Emlyn's most notable work was the late-18th-century restoration of St George's Chapel (1785–1790), where he designed and supervised alterations including the choir screen in Coade stone, the organ case, the altar, and new stalls for the Royal Family, all crafted to harmonize seamlessly with the medieval Gothic structure.

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St John the Baptist, Stamford, Lincs.

Wall tablet for John Booth, a relief of a female figure leaning on an urn, signed Coade 1799.

No photograph currently available.

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Coade on the Mausoleum

Duke of Fife - Banff 1792.

Frieze of Quatrafoil panels.

https://www.facebook.com/reel/1239785573053481

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Of Tangential Interest -

https://georgiangroup.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/GGJ_2012_10_Thacker.pdf

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Coade Stone Mural Monument, All Saints, Holbeton, Devon.

To John Bulteel.

1801.

Indented COADE & SEALEY LAMBETH

Bottom right Corner

https://devonchurchland.co.uk/description/holbeton-church-of-all-saints-description/

William Palmer (1673 - 1739) and his son Benjamin Palmer fl 1712 - 78) - London Sculptors. The Late Roubiliac Type Socle.

 

The 1756 Monument to Arthur O'Keeffe .

In the Cloisters at Westminster Abbey.

Another bust which appears to have the early Roubiliac type socle.

The Monument is inscribed Palmer to the bottom right.

It seems the family home was in Dunbullog(e) in Co. Cork in Ireland (his brother Daniel owned a mill and estate there). 

https://okeefeclan.org/2020/castles/

It is possible his father was the Arthur O'Keeffe from Ballymaguirk co. Cork in Ireland who was admitted to Gray's Inn in London in 1682-1683. (The family motto is the same but his coat of arms is different to that mentioned above). Arthur the younger was admitted to Lincoln's Inn in 1738 and Gray's Inn in 1740.

The Inns were colleges for lawyers. He married Isabella Casburne, widow, at her house in Piccadilly 4th April 1738 by special licence. The marriage was recorded in the parish register of St James's Church, Westminster. 

He died childless - his will described him as of Bedford Row, London and his wife inherited his mansion and parklands at Bailey Park, Heathfield in Sussex. (now Heathfield Park) Isabella bequeathed all her property to her sister Mary Ann (who later married Arthur's cousin Cornelius O'Keeffe).

Bailey Park was sold in 1766 to Lt Gen. Elliot

 

Arthur was buried in the cloister on 3rd October 1756 and his wife on 5th October 1762 aged 70.

Excerpts from The Marriage, Baptismal, and Burial Registers of the Collegiate Church of the Abbey of St Peter Westminster... - Page 401 Joseph Lemuel Chester · 1876

Page 403 Anstis O'Keeffe in the West Cloister. Mother of  Arthur O'Keeffe

The Will of Arthur O'Keefe.(O'Kyffe) of Bedford Row - PROB-11-826-140. a very short document where he appoints his wife Isabella (d.1762) sole heir and executor.

Isabella left Bailey Park to her sister Mary Ann.

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https://gunnis.henry-moore.org/henrymoore/works/recordlist.php?-action=find&-sortfieldone=List+Number&-sortorderone=ascend&sculptor_id=2025

After the death of his father, William Palmer, in 1739, he took over the yard in Bedford Row near Gray’s Inn. 

Shortly before his death William had supplied Henry Purefoy of Shalstone, Bucks, with a purple marble mantelpiece and chimney slab, together with a black slab for another chimneypice. Purefoy wrote a series of letters to William and then to Benjamin Palmer expressing his disatisfaction with various aspects of this work, particularly the purple marble slab, which he thought ‘must be Counterfeit, for everywhere where it looks like mother of pearl it blisters & rises up, & where it is trod upon it breaks of[f] in a thin shell & underneath is a course stone like freestone’ (Eland 1931, vol I, 58). 

After Benjamin sent a replacement slab to Shalstone in April 1741, Purefoy wrote to complain that the new one would probably peel too, that it had small cracks which might expand and that it was ‘not near so good marble as the mantle piece itself’ (ibid, 59). Purefoy’s letters ceased after the new slab was laid so it seems that his fears were groundless.

Palmer’s most ambitious work is the statue of Sir William Harpur (see images below) over the old Grammar School at Bedford (23). He also provided the Harpur monument (18) which has medallion portraits and was paid £200 for both works in 1768 (Bedford School MS, account book, in Gunnis 1968, 287). 

Gunnis comments that ‘as a statuary Palmer is not as good as his father, and his monuments, though large, are not particularly distinguished’. Those to Arthur O’Keefe and Sir Thomas Gage feature portrait busts (15, 6). Palmer retired in 1778, and a sale of his stock was held on 7 and 8 July that year.

Literary References: Eland 1931, vol I, pp 53-4, 58-60; Gunnis 1968, 287

Archival References: Harpur charity documents, Bedford School, fol 4c (bill for Harpur’s monument and statue); fol 5a, (Palmer's bill for the above); fol 5b (letter from Palmer to the master, governors and trustees of the Bedford Charity, complaining about lack of payment

Auction Catalogue: Palmer 1778

Sir William Harpur. 

Sculpture by Benjamin Palmer.

Portland Stone. 

Bedford

https://artuk.org/discover/artworks/sir-william-harpur-c-14961574-311031

van der Meulen - sculptor.

In 1768 he sent in a model for the statue of Sir William Harpur to be erected at Bedford School, but was unsuccessful and the commission was given to Benjamin Palmer.

John Ferdinand Van der Meulen showed extensively with the Free Society and other exhibiting societies between 1765 and 1780, none of his works appears to have survived. 

On 24 May 1765 he received a premium from the Society of Arts (8) and another followed in 1767 (9), at which time he lived in Little Castle Street, Oxford Road.  (2). He was a minor beneficiary in Peter Scheemakers’s will and conceivably worked for him before Scheemakers departed for Antwerp in 1771. The son, Van der Meulen II, lived in Castle Street with his father in 1778-80.

Literary References: Graves 1907, 263-4 ; Gunnis 1968, 406

Will: PROB 11/ 1082, 17 v-r (Peter Scheemakers).

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Monumen in St John Lateran at Hengrave,

William Palmer (1673–1739) was an English sculptor and stonemason based in London. He has been described as "one of the most important of early eighteenth-century sculptors" in England, his main works mostly being funerary monuments

He was born in London the son of William Palmer, a coachman in the parish of St Giles-in-the-Fields. He was apprenticed to James Hardy in 1687 but in 1689/90 transferred to the yard of Josiah Tully. He became a Freeman mason in 1694 and returned to work in Hardy's yard. In 1696 he went to work as an assistant to John Nost. [2]

 

By 1710 he had his own stoneyard at Red Lion Square. In 1718 he became official mason to Lincoln's Inn and remained such until his death in late 1739. He was married to Anne and was father to the sculptor Benjamin Palmer who took over his father's stoneyard at Gray's Inn.

A preliminary list of the works of Benjamin Palmer.

Not to be entirely relied upon - all these refs need to be checked.

Info here from Gunnis.

c.1742. Edward Payne (†1728). Funerary Monument,  St Nicholas, Hough-on-the-Hill, Lincs

1756. William Harpur.  Statue. Town Hall, Bedford.

†1768.  Sir William Harpur (†1768) and Dame Alice Harpur. Funerary Monument. St Paul, Bedford.

1742. Sir Thomas Gage. Funerary Monument.  Hengrave, Suffolk.

1741.  Stephen Master.  Funerary Monument ?  Daventry, Northants.

?1742. Thomas Master. Funerary Monument Westminster Abbey, London.

?1744.John Willis. Funerary Monument  Malmesbury, Wilts.

1757 Henry Uthwatt. Funerary Monument †.  Lathbury, Bucks.

†1770.Margaret Sparhauke. Funerary Monument  Graveley, Herts.

†1712. William Middlemore.  Funerary Monument St Wulfram, Grantham, Lincs

†1754.  Thomas Price. Funerary Monument Llangyfelach, Glamorgan.

J?1769. ohnson.  Funerary Monument Sandy, Beds.

†1742.Thomas Payne. Funerary Monument  Hough-on-the-Hill, Lincs.

 †1751. Sir Thomas Stepney. Funerary MonumentSt Elli, Llanelli, Carmarthen.

?1753. Charles, Lord Stourton. Funerary Monument  Cheam, Surrey, Lumley Chapel

post-1742. Sir Roger (†1738) and Lady Maria Meredith Funerary Monument  Leeds, Kent

†1756. Arthur O’Keefe. Funerary Monument  Westminster Abbey, London, cloisters

c1740. Frances Legh.  Funerary Monument . St Elphin, Warrington, Lancs.

†1749.Arthur Bevan MP. Funerary Monument . Laugharne, Carmarthen.

†1753.William Rose.  Funerary Monument  East Retford, Notts

?1771.Rev Louis Monoux. Funerary Monument Sandy, Beds

†1761. Lieutenant-Colonel John Littlehales and wife (†1807).  Funerary Monument  St Leonard, Bridgnorth, Salop.

 †1777    Samuel Prime.  Funerary Monument.  Temple Church, London.

Is this bust by Nollekens - another post on the Roubiliac Late Type Socle. William Posonby Earl of Bessborough.

The Two Ponsonby/ Bessborough Monuments in Derby Cathedral.

The Rysbrack Monument to Caroline, Countess of Bessborough.

and the monument to William Ponsonby, Viscount Duncannon, Second Earl of Bessborough by Joseph Nollekens. from 1743 MP for Derby.

He became commissioner of the Admiralty and admiral of Munster, Lord of the Treasury and from 1758, following his father’s death, joint postmaster-general. Bessborough combined politics with artistic patronage assembling a large and notable collection of antiquities and antique gems.

A brief look at the monuments to act as an aide memoire for a possble future post.

Church Monuments using earlier busts are unusual but as used here are not unique ref. Cirencester.

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Here we find the use of what I have characterised as the "late Roubiliac type socle" on two busts on the two Ponsonby / Bessborough monuments at Derby.

Many of the busts created by Roubiliac in the latter part of his career use variations on this type of socle.

see my posts for further examples -

https://bathartandarchitecture.blogspot.com/2025/05/marble-bust-of-laocoon.html

https://bathartandarchitecture.blogspot.com/2025/12/the-roubiliac-type-socle-some-mor.html

I have discovered at least 18 instances of Roubiliac's use of this type of socle.

I can only find two instances of the use of variations of this form of socle by Joseph Wilton.

Here we have the use of this type of socle on the busts on two monuments in Derby Cathedral.

The Monument to the Countess of Bessborough by Michael Rysbrack of post 1760 and the monument to her husband William Ponsonby 2nd Earl of Bessborough by Joseph  Nollekens of post 1793.

Neither Rysbrack or Nollekens used this type of socle on their portrait busts as far as I am aware.

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William Ponsonby and a bust mentioned in correspondence with Mr Stanley in 1768.

To cloud the issue - there is a letter from William Ponsonby, Earl of Bessborough dated 9 August 1768.

Presenting compliments to Mr. Stanley about a bust left at his house in London by Mr. Stanley.

https://archives.yale.edu/repositories/3/archival_objects/834

Is this the bust on the Derby Cathedral Ponsonby /Bessborough monument?

This reference cannot be to Charles (Simon Carl) Stanley the English/Danish sculptor who died in 1761 but is perhaps his son Carl Frederick Stanley (d. Rome 1805) who trahis studio.

The second marriage of Charles Stanley took place on 2 August 1737 to Magdalene Margrethe Lindemann, the sister of the German chaplain to the Court of St James. The couple had a son, Carl Frederick Stanley who trained as a sculptor with his father.

 Carl Frederik Stanley became one of the first students to enter the new Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts in 1755. That same year he won his first award and in 1758 he won the Academy's large gold medal for the sculpture Noah's Sacrifice.

see - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carl_Frederik_Stanley

In the summer of 1746 he accepted an invitation from Frederick V to return to Copenhagen as court sculptor, a post he held until his death in 1761. He departed hastily for Denmark leaving his affairs in a confused state. Letters to Leeke Okeover from Joseph Sanderson, who was responsible for building work at Okeover, relate that Stanley left ‘without settling with several of his acquaintances’ and that he had failed to show Sanderson a bust, a chimneypiece (4, 6) and a gilt picture frame with ribbon and flowers, all prepared for Okeover (Sanderson/Okeover, 25.10.1746). A later letter adopted a more philosophical tone: ‘One thing we must allow him [Stanley], is your ceiling is well done and cheap’ (Sanderson/Okeover, 9 December 1746).

After returning from England in 1746 Charles later had a successful career in Denmark, where he became a professor at the Copenhagen Academy.

Charles Stanley d.1761 in England.

https://bathartandarchitecture.blogspot.com/2021/02/marble-bust-by-charles-stanley-of-mary.html

I have written a long essay on the  Little Easton Church Monumentto the Maynards and the possible involvement of Roubiliac.

Given the date of the monument and the sudden rapid departure of Stanley to Denmark in October 1746 - I suspect that the monument might not have been finished and although there is no documentary evidence the work might have been concluded by another sculptor.

 This idiosyncratic sculpture is very much a favourite of mine and shows the influences of the best sculptors working in London in the mid 18th century, the pose is similar to that on the Craggs Monument by Guelfi at Westminster Abbey with the central figure of Henry leaning on an urn with the relief representing his wife but without the crossed legs. 

The pair of lamps are similar to those used on several monuments by Henry Cheere. 

The bust of  Elizabeth Lady Maynard show the influence if not actually the hand of Louis Francois Roubiliac and the influence of Rysbrack and the Saxon deities at Stowe House Buckingham.

It uses the same form of dress as that used on a bust of Mary Okeover (suggested as by Stanley but I would suggest Roubilic!)

https://bathartandarchitecture.blogspot.com/2025/05/the-maynard-monuments-at-little-easton.html

For a potted history of Charles Stanley (d.1761) see -

https://gunnis.henry-moore.org/henrymoore/sculptor/browserecord.php?-action=browse&-recid=2555

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This is dangerous territory but I suggest that this pair of busts busts had been made as a pair for display in a family homeand and added to the Derby Ponsonby Bessborough monuments by Rysbrack and Nollekens.

This is not impossible - the earlier Bathurst monument in Cirencester church by Nollekens utilises a pair of earlier busts. see my post on the earlier carreer busts by Nollekens which use a socle with the eared supports convex panel specific to him - developed by him whilst working in the Rome studio of Bartolemeo Cavaceppi who had also used a similar form of socle on his busts based on ancient antecedents.

https://bathartandarchitecture.blogspot.com/2024/11/some-earlier-nollekens-busts.html

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Church of St John the Baptist, Cirencester - Nollekens Design for the monument to Earl and Countess Bathurst, c.1776.

Allen, 1st Earl Bathurst and Countess Bathurst (It is my belief that the busts are almost certainly not by Nollekens).

 I cannot find any good close up photographs of these busts and the monument which are high up and backlit by a stained glass window make it difficult to obtain good close ups for comparison.

I suspect that the bust of Allen Bathurst is by Peter Scheemakers and is related to a missing bust of Bathurst from the Temple of Friendship at Stowe.

The socles are typical of earlier works by Nollekens.

In my opinion there is a sort of uniformity almost blandness in Scheemakers depictions of male subjects but his female busts are usually much more realistic.

see - https://bathartandarchitecture.blogspot.com/2024/11/scheemakers-at-kintbury.html

https://bathartandarchitecture.blogspot.com/2019/04/anonymous-bust-at-lady-lever-art.html

William Ponsonby, 2nd Earl of Bessborough PC PC (Ire) (1704 – 11 March 1793) was an Anglo-Irish politician. 

He was an Irish and English peer and member of the House of Lords (styled Hon. William Ponsonby from 1723 to 1739 and Viscount Duncannon from 1739 to 1758). 

He served in both the Irish and the British House of Commons, before entering the House of Lords, and held office as a Lord Commissioner of the Admiralty, Lord Commissioner of the Treasury, and as Postmaster General of the United Kingdom. 

He was also a Privy Counsellor, Chief Secretary for Ireland and Earl of Bessborough.

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                  The Ponsonby/ Bessborough Monuments in Derby Cathedral.

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The Thomas Missing Monument of 1738.

With the Marble Bust on the Monument by Roubiliac.

at Holy Rood Church, Crofton and Stubbington, Hampshire.

Formerly Crofton.

 Perhaps acoincidence but the Nollekens Ponsonby / Derby Monument and the Crofton and Stubbington Monuments are very similar in form.

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The Rysbrack Monument to Caroline, Countess of Bessborough.

Born 22, May  1719 - Death: January 20, 1760 aged 40.

Derby Cathedral , Derbyshire, England.

The bust on the monument which utilises the "late period Roubiliac type socle" is perhaps an earlier bust the pair to the bust of Lord Bessborough on his monument in the same church.

Daughter of William Cavendish, 3rd Duke of Devonshire and Catherine Hoskins, Duchess of Devonshire.

Wife of William Ponsonby, 2nd Earl of Bessborough - married 5 Jul 1739 aged 20.

Mother of Catharine Beauclerk, Duchess of St. Albans (Ponsonby); Charlotte FitzWilliam and Frederick Ponsonby, 3rd Earl of Bessborough

Sister of William Cavendish, 4th Duke of Devonshire, Prime Minister; Lord George Augustus Cavendish; Lady Elizabeth Ponsonby; Rachel Walpole, Countess of Orford; Lord Frederick Cavendish (British Army officer) and 1 other.

She had 8 children.

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Caroline, Countess of Bessborough.

A pastel? portrait currently housed in the Stansted Park Home Gallery.

By Jean Etienne Liotard.

William Ponsonby, Earl of Bessborough.

By Jeremiah Davidson.

https://artuk.org/discover/artworks/william-ponsonby-17041793-2nd-earl-of-bessborough-172335

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The Pastel Portrait by Jean Etinne Liotard.

on paper

Height 60 cm x width 48 cm

entered the collection in 1873

Rijksmuseum - they say -

Ponsonby first encountered Liotard at Rome in 1738 and took him as his draughtsman to Constantinople, where the artist’s independent career began. He remained a loyal friend and patron, eventually owning some 70 works by Liotard. 

This portrait was presumably made during one of Liotard’s two sojourns in London. It is one of Liotard’s rare excursions into Neoclassicism, and presents the sitter as a trompe l’oeil Roman shell cameo.

https://www.rijksmuseum.nl/en/collection/object/Willam-Ponsonby-Viscount-Duncannon-and-Later-2nd-Earl-of-Bessborough--45a11f9db6b758855d6285f1f6a28d55

There is a second version and probably the original of this portrait -it is  currently with London Art Dealers Libson Yarker.

William Ponsonby 2nd Earl of Bessborough.

Commissioned by the sitter;

Princess Amelia (1711-1786) daughter of George III, a gift from the sitter;

William Henry Cavendish Bentinck, 3rd Duke of Portland, bequeathed by the above, 1786 (inscribed on a label on the original backboard, now lost: When H.R.H. The Princess Amelia Dyes, this Picture is to be given to the Duke of Portland);

By descent at Welbeck Abbey to 2017.

Pastel on Vellum in its original Carlo Maratta Frame.

620 x 495 mm.

There is an excellent indepth essay on ther website.

https://www.libson-yarker.com/pictures/william-ponsonby-2nd-earl-of-bessborough

Princess Amelia's portrait bust was sculpted by Roubiliac (Fitzwilliam Museum).

The socle is very similar to those on the busts on the Ponsonby Monuments

https://bathartandarchitecture.blogspot.com/2017/11/the-marble-bust-of-princess-amelia.html

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Onyx Cameo of Ponsonby then styled Viscount Duncannon.

1750.

Johann Lorenz Natter (1703 - 65).

His skill in carving lead the German medalist Johann Lorenz Natter to Switzerland, Venice, Florence, England, Denmark, Sweden, Holland, and Russia, where he died. 

William Ponsonby (1704–1793), an influential parliamentary politician, was an original member of the band of aesthetes known as the Dilettanti Society. 

Natter presented him here with cropped hair, in the neo-Roman style of budding Neoclassicism. The ground stratum is carved so thin as to be transparent, allowing a delicate play of light. A companion cameo dated 1750 of Ponsonby’s wife, Lady Caroline, née Cavendish, was auctioned at Christie’s in London in 1923 but has since disappeared.

The Paragraphs below adapted from - https://www.libson-yarker.com/pictures/william-ponsonby-2nd-earl-of-bessborough

Bessborough’s interest in antique gems possibly stemmed from his relationship with the Dukes of Devonshires. The 3rd Duke’s father, William Cavendish, 2nd Duke of Devonshire was a hugely celebrated collector of gems and the 3rd Duke showed evident interest in the collection.

Around 1754 Bessborough acquired sixty gems from Philip Dormer Stanhope, 4th Earl of Chesterfield, who had, in turn, been bequeathed them by his brother John Stanhope. This group contained some very considerable gems, including a remarkable intaglio depicting Sirius now in the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. At the same date Bessborough is recorded acquiring gems from the collections of the physician Richard Mead, including a large cameo of the head of Medusa (collection: National Museums, Liverpool) and George Montagu, 2nd Earl of Halifax.

Bessborough had also become acquainted with the gem engraver and antiquarian Lorenz Natter who compiled a catalogue of both the Devonshire collection of gems at Chatsworth and Bessborough’s collection, which was eventually published in 1761. Bessborough sold his gems shortly afterwards to George Spencer, 4th Duke of Marlborough for the considerable sum of £5,000.

https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/198376

for an excellent and informative article on Natter see - https://britishartjournal.co.uk/lorenz-natter-1705-1763/

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The Fogg Art Museum Harvard Portrait of William Ponsonby.

By John Singleton Copley (1738 - 1815).

Signed: l.r.: J. S. Copley RA/ 1790.

inscription: on verso: Earl of Bessborough

Provenance - Claude A. C. Ponsonby, presumably by descent; sold at Christie's sale of Ponsonby Heirlooms to Sabin, March 28, 1908; purchased through Martin Birnbaum by Grenville L. Winthrop, November 1941; his bequest to the Fogg Art Museum, 1943.

The portrait survived the fire of 1923 at Bessborough House, County Kilkenny

There are two other versions of this portrait - Lord Clanbrassil and Admiral Caldewell.

The creation of the mezzotint was the subject of some controversy

https://harvardartmuseums.org/collections/object/230361

Robert  Dunkarton, after John Singleton Copley, Portrait of William Ponsonby, Earl of Bessborough (1794), mezzotint, Harvard Art Museums/Fogg Museum