This is a series of disjointed notes to act as an aide memoire - the plan being to expand on it in the future and to create single subject posts.
This subject of Mrs Coade and her manufactory is a huge rabbit hole to disappear down and I am only scratching at the surface here.
The early history of the Coade manufactury is inextricably entwined with that of the sculptor Daniel Pincot and his assistant John Bacon I (1740 - 99) who was with the company probably from the beginning in 1769, he had worked previously from 1755 as an apprentice to Nicholas Crispe at Lambeth until 1764 when he became an assistant to Daniel Pincot artificial stone works at Paternoster Row, Spitalfields and then at the Narrow Wall Lambeth works, before the purchase of Pincot's business by the Coades in 1769 and the later dismissal of Pincot as overseer by Eleanor Coade in 1771 and Bacon becoming manager.
Bacon was awarded the first gold medal for sculpture by the Royal
Academy in 1769.
An invaluable introduction to the subject of the origins of Coade and the Coade family by Caroline Stanford - highly recommended is at -
https://www.landmarktrust.org.uk/globalassets/3.-images-and-documents-to-keep/history-albums/belmont-history-album.pdf
Any investigation into Coade should commence with Alison Kelly's magesterial work Mrs Coade's Stone pub. 1990.
..............................
John Bacon I (1740 - 99).
by George Dance.
Bacon deserves a monograph of his own! -
https://photoarchive.paul-mellon-centre.ac.uk/objects/498935/john-bacon-ra-1740--1799?ctx=6a41c1a905a1e354ac1de657a3c05202cf1d7fea&idx=23
For an in depth look at Bacon see -
https://etheses.whiterose.ac.uk/id/eprint/14231/1/639415.pdf
For an early biography see - by Rev Richard Cecil - this edition pub. 1822.
Rather too much about his religios fervour and not enough about his sculpture
https://play.google.com/books/reader?id=-AJt8wUup4sC&pg=GBS.PP6&hl=en_GB
..............................
I could not have written any of this without first reading the pioneering work and invaluable source.
Mrs Coade's Stone by Alison Kelly pub. 1990.
also most useful has been Revisiting the Origins of Coade Stone by Caroline Stanford.
Another very useful and updated resource is -
Another more up to date source of information is perhaps -
Coade Stone: A History and Analysis Howell G. M. Edwards, Christopher J. Brooke - ·pub 2024.
I do not own a copy of this inordinately expensive publication -$110
I do not understand why this publication is so expensive - why not publish on line - as I do and make the information freely available rather than limit it to only libraries and those who can afford it.
.....................
of tangential interest see also -
The analysis of two historic fired artificial stonewares: Coade stone (18th–19th centuries) and a recent discovery from Oxnead Hall, Norfolk (16th–17th centuries). Brooke, C. J., Edwards, H. G. M., Košek, F., Jehlička, J.,
Stanford, C., & Champion, M. J. (2023). Archaeometry, 65(4), 691–701.
...............
The origins of the manufacture of Artificial Stone in England -
Richard Holt, Batty Langley, and Daniel Pincot.
Richard Holt and his Artificial Stone - 1722.
In 1722, Richard Holt took out a patent with the carpenter-turned-architect Thomas Ripley A patient for ‘compound liquid metall, by which artificiall
stone and marble is made by casting the same into moulds of any form, as
statues, columns, capitalls’, was granted to Thomas Ripley and Richard Holt,
Esq’s, on 31st May 1722”.
A second patented to Richard Holt and Samuel London
was issued on the 13th June 1722, “for a certain new composition or mixture
(without any sort of clay) for making of white ware, formed and moulded in a
new method”.
‘A certain Compound Liquid Metal never before known and used by the Ancients or Moderns, by which Artificial Stone and Marble is made by casting or running the metall into Moulds of any Form or Figure ... which being petrified or vetrified [sic] and finished by Strong Fire, becomes more durable and harder than Stone and Marble ...’
In 1730 Holt published - A Short Treatise of Artificial Stone, as 'tis now made, and
converted into all manner of curious embellishments, and proper ornaments, of
architecture: with a grovelling dedication to Lord Burlington.
The Richard Holt treatise is available on line at -
https://archive.org/details/bim_eighteenth-century_a-short-treatise-of-arti_holt-richard_1730
He gave his address as The Artificial Stone Warehouse over against York Buildings Stairs and near Cupers Bridge in Lambeth, Surrey in 1730.
Holt’s Short Treatise informs us that: ‘a good round Catalogue of these [applications] has already been published for me…and runs as follows, viz. Columns, Pedestals, Entablatures, Cornices,Pediments, Ballustrades, Statues, Rusticks, Fascias, Coppings of Walls and Chimneys, Chimney-pieces, Hearth-Stones, Architraves, Frontispieces of Doors, Windows, Alcoves and Grotto’s, Cascades, Obelisques, Arches, Piazza’s, Key-Stones, Steps, Pavements, Urns, balls…Tomb-stones, Monuments, Sun-Dials, Crests for Doors, gates and Gateways, Statuary of all Sorts,
Pipes of all Bores and Sizes…the prices are fix’d as near as I can, to about one Third part of the Price of Stone, and one Half of the Price of Lead.
There's alſo a Show of Goods on the Gable-End, towards the River, that will direct to the Houſe; where, at any time, when the Water is
above or about Half Flood, Gentlemen may Land at the very Door, and have
nothing to do, but to Step, ot set their Foot, out the Boat, into the House.
The short lived Holt business had disappeared after August 1732, and the final sale notice has an air of desperation: Holt’s goods were ‘To be sold at a very cheap Rate, for ready Money'.
As yet no confirmed example of his work has survived.
............................
Batty Langley and Artificial Stone.
See - Batty Langley's Early Years in London 1729 -35, Langley, Hans Sloane and Artificial Stone - Christine Macaleavy. Garden History, Vol. 44, No. 2 (Winter 2016), pp. 191-208
(18 pages)
https://www.jstor.org/stable/44987901
I have touched briefly on Langley and his Artificial Stone elsewhere see -
.....................
Daily Journal (London, England), Friday, March 26, 1731;
Issue 3189.
Langley was evidently making artificial stone before 1730
for he hads staged a demonstration in London on 11 November 1729, when a comparison
was made between the weight-bearing capacity of his product and natural
Portland stone.
It was reported in the Northampton Mercury that the Portland
stone broke when the weight placed on it exceeded 168 lbs, whilst Langley's
formidable artificial stone only collapsed when the weight was increased to 276
lbs.
George Vertue described Langley’s product as ‘a New invention of casting in stone
or a hard composition - busts, statues, columns &c. or any frize or cornish
workes for building. in immitation of free stone. & said to be more durable
... made near Lambeth and sold by one Batty Langley’, whom he described
disparagingly as ‘a bold face undertaker’ (Vertue III, 51).
The material may
not indeed have been entirely of Langley’s own invention since a similar substance had
been patented by Richard Holt in 1722 and Holt maintained that Langley obtained
the formula by deception.
During the spring and
summer of 1731 Langley advertised that ‘Sculptured or Carved Ornaments’,
including statues, busts, ‘all manner of curious Vases, Urns, Pine Apples,
Pedestals for Sundials, Balustrades, Key-Stones to the Arches of Windows and
Doors, Bases and Capital for Piers of Gates, Columns and Pilasters’ were
available from his warehouse at ‘the Hercules Head, near the Faulcon-Stairs on
the Bank-side in Southwark’ (Daily Ad, 25 May-6 July 1731).
Holt had retaliated
with a notice stating that ‘it appears from three several Affidavits, how and
by what means [Langley] has come at any Insight into the Art of making
Artificial Stone; and how very defective and short of Holt’s true Secret, his
Discoveries (by tampering with Workmen) must needs be’ (Daily Ad, 28 May-1 June
1731).
None of Holts or Langley’s artificial stone products have been identified and no
information about the composition has been discovered but it is possible that a
fired clay portrait medallion of Sir Isaac Newton, formerly in Langley’s possession,
is one of his products (British Museum MLA SL 1984).
An investigation into the artificial stone business was
carried out by Rupert Gunnis, in which he noticed some payments to a 'Langley'
for “stone?” garden ornaments at Longford Castle, Wiltshire, 1748-58.
...............................
Aaron Mutchell.
From Stephen Switzer - A General Introduction to Hydrostatics.... 1729.
Mentioning his neighbour at Vauxhall.
Refering to Pipes patented by William Edwrds of Monmouth and manufactured by Mutchell.
Switzer mentions Mutchell again in the Practical Fruit Gardener of 1731, page 349.
supplying pipes and vauses.
and again in 1734 in A Universal System of Water and Waterworks...
...............................
John Bacon's trade card c. late 1760's.
John Bacon (1740 - 99), his relationship with Nicholas Crisp (1704 - 84) and Daniel Pincot (before the annexation of his business by Eleanor Coade in 1769).
These are rough notes and will need editing.
John Bacon (1740 - 99) was the son
of Thomas Bacon, a cloth worker and was apprentice to Nicholas Crisp in 1755.
Nicholas Crisp was a man of many parts - freeman of the Haberdashers Company, a merchant, watchmaker and owner of a jewellery shop in Bow Churchyard in the City of
London until 1766, he was in partnership with John Saunders, a Lambeth delftware potter.
Crisp was also a
founder and very active member of the Society of Arts which was founded at Rawthmells Coffee House 22 March 1754.
The British Magazine and Review, or Universal Miscellany,
for October 1782, says:‘
In the year 1755, he [John Bacon] was placed with Mr Crisp
of Bow Church Yard, who having a Manufactory of China at Lambeth, which Mr
Bacon sometimes attended, he had an opportunity of observing the models of
different sculptors, which were frequently sent to a pottery in the same
premises to be burned. The sight of these models inspired him with an
inclination for this art’.
the Universal Magazine of Knowledge (September 1800) reports
that at Vauxhall John Bacon
‘was chiefly employed in forming shepherds, shepherdesses,
and such like small ornamental pieces; yet, for a self-taught artist to perform
even works like these with taste, and, in less than two years, form (as he did)
all the models for the manufactory, was to give indications of no ordinary
powers'.
.................
The Vauxhall porcelain factory was operating at the Glasshouse
Street Works, in Vauxhall, South London, when operated by the potter John
Sanders (or from 1758, his heir William Sanders) and the merchant/entrepreneur
Nicholas Crisp, between 1751 and 1764 (info BM).
The Glasshouse Street manufacory was probably the last of the English
delftware pothouses, manufacturing delftware from 1743-1784. As well as the tin-glazed ware, experimental porcelain was
manufactured between 1752 and 1763 based on experiments by John Sanders and
Nicholas Crisp. Between 1784 and 1823, stoneware and no longer delftware was made there.
John Sanders had founded the pothouse no later than 1743 and also opened another
delftware pothouse at Mortlake between 1743 and 1745.
Sanders was partnered by
Nicholas Crisp from 1751 until 1758, when Sanders died leaving his share of the pottery to
his son William and son-in-law Henry Richards (1758-72).
When the factory went bankrupt in 1764, Crisp moved to Bovey
Tracey in Devon. The earliest evidence for porcelain production there dates from 1767.
https://www.academia.edu/28036592/Nicholas_Crisp_at_Bovey_Tracey
Crisp was bankrupted again in 1768. He died at Indio in 1774.
Henry Richards was succeeded by
his son John Richards (1772-84). There then followed a long period when only
stoneware was manufactured at Glasshouse Street by Henry Bingham and the Moss
brothers (1784-1823).
By
1764, at the age of 24 Bacon is recorded as a modeller at Wedgwood at the same time as he was
producing models for the Chelsea-Derby factory.
Enrolling at the Royal Academy in 1769 enabled Bacon, at 28,
to make the transition from a modeller in manufacture to a professional
sculptor.
The foundation of the Royal Academy in 1768, with its focus on
teaching, saw many of the sculptors who had begun their careers by exhibiting at
the Society of Arts enrol at the RA school. John Flaxman and Thomas Banks
registered in 1769 and Joseph Nollekens in 1770.
John Bacon won Royal Academy Schools Gold Medal in 1769. -
For Memoires of John Bacon by Rev. Cecil see - not entirely reliable!
https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=nnc1.0036692689&seq=9
In January 1767 Daniel Pincot (who is erroneously listed as
‘Pincat’ in Graves 1907, 199 and Gunnis 1968, 304) advertised that he had set
up as an artificial-stone manufacturer in Goulston Square, Whitechapel.
Pincot advertised that he had set up as an artificial-stone
manufacturer in Goulston Square, Whitechapel. He offered ‘all sorts of rich
carved Ornaments used in Buildings, viz. Tablets, Frizes, Medalions, Ionic and
Corinthian Capitals, Statues, Bustos, Vases, etc in several Compositions; some
resembling Portland Stone, but much harder and more durable, others still more
beautiful, approaching nearer to Marble; the Whole executed in a Manner far
exceeding any Thing of the like Kind that has hitherto been offered to the
Publick’ (Daily Ad, 31 Jan 1767 cited by Valpy 1986, 210).
On 7 July 1767 it
was announced that ‘the Proprietor of the Artificial Stone Manufactory in
Goulston-Square, has now opened a Warehouse at No. 18, the Corner of
Glastonbury Court, in Long Acre’ (Daily Ad, 7 July 1767 cited by Valpy 1986,
210).
Glastonbury Court ran between Rose Street and Conduit Court - Later replaced by Lazenby Court.
of tangential interest - locating Glastonbury Court -
https://bathartandarchitecture.blogspot.com/2024/01/fire-in-st-martins-lane.html
This may or may not have been Pincot himself, for by October 1767 George Davy
had taken over the Pincot Goulston Square premises and Pincot was trading from Narrow
Wall, Lambeth - some time between February and October 1767, when he advertised ‘a
large Quantity of Goods of near 100 different Subjects, such as Figures, Busts,
Tablets, Friezes, Medalions, Vases, Capitals of Different Orders of various
Sizes’ for sale at his warehouse at 18 Long Acre, near Covent Garden.
In 1767 Pincot exhibited an ‘antique basso-relievo,
in artificial stone, unburned’ at the Free Society. giving his address as near Kings Arms Stairs, on the Narrow Wall, Lambeth.
In December 1767 there
was a sale at Christie’s of artificial stone produced at Goulston Square over
the last year, presumably by both Pincot and Davy.
The catalogue survives in the Christie archive and shows
that prices were considerably lower than those of comparable items listed in
the catalogue of the Coade Factory of Lambeth, published in 1783.
In March 1768 George Davy announced that a large quantity of his
artificial stone had been sold by John Moreing at the Great Sale Room in Maiden
Lane, Covent Garden, adding ‘if due Encouragement is given to this Undertaking,
the Proprietor intends to continue the Manufactory’ (Daily Ad, 23/24 March
1768).
Further sales at Moreing’s auction house and then at Blyth’s sale room
in Dean Street, Soho were advertised throughout 1768 and in 1770. The public
response appears to have been less than enthusiastic for Davy commented, ‘the
Proprietor has reason to think that many Gentlemen entertain a less opinion of
Artificial Stone by the Reports of some whose Interest it may be to deprecate
it’ (Daily Ad, 27 May 1768).
Davy’s last known advertisements appeared in April 1771
(Daily Ad, 29 April 1771) and by July 1773 he was financially ruined. He wrote
to his patron, the 2nd Marquess of Rockingham requesting payment for four
medallions of Alexander and Hercules, explaining that they ‘were made by
your particular Order and at the Sale I bought them for your Lordship but am
now so poor that I cannot clare [sic] the lots therefore let me intreat your
Lordship to be so kind as to advance me the money or else the goods will be
resold and all the charges attending it will fall on me’. He also informed him
that if he had any further orders he should approach a ‘Mr Smith at
Nightsbridge’ who had bought all his moulds (Rockingham Vouchers, Sheffield
City Library, No 1, microfilm A314).
In October 1773 Davy wrote a yet more
desperate letter to the Duke of Northumberland asking him to settle a bill for
£14 8s for various pieces of artificial stone (5),‘for I must Actually go to
Prison in a City Action if I can’t raise fifteen pounds by the 15th or 16th of
this month’ (Davy/Northumberland).
Rockingham bought reliefs, busts and statues after the
antique from Davy, as well as a statue of a druid and charity children, both subjects were later produced by the Coade Factory. Some of Davy’s moulds may
still have been in use at Lambeth more than 50 years later, for it seems likely
that ‘Mr Smith at Nightsbridge’ was a predecessor or partner of Bridges of
Knightsbridge whose factory was bought by Mrs Coade in 1775.
This suggestion of
a direct connection between Davy, Bridges and Coade is supported by the
production of large-scale statues of druids by all three businesses (see
Bridges, of Knightsbridge, 1 and Coade Factory, of Lambeth, 207).
The Coade Druid of 1796 at Croome Park, Worcs.
Another much delapidated Coade Druid with a different hairstyle was at Erdigg.
https://denisestartin.co.uk/2022/03/13/the-case-of-the-missing-druid/
and another again with a different hair style at Priory Park Chichester. The Coade druid was originally placed above a water supply in South
Street Chichester in 1776 and relocated as a feature in the public park in 1873. another at Shugborough much mutilated and another at the Vyne
https://historicengland.org.uk/advice/technical-advice/buildings/decorative-features/coade-stone/
Pincot made no reference to the Mrs Coades in his pamphlet of 1770 and he
seems to have angered the Coades by taking certain business transactions into his own
hands, including an agreement to provide Borghese vases for Stourhead and
Kedleston.
The Borghese vase currently at Keddleston is indented Coade London Fecit.
It should be stated in Pincot's defence that it is possible that he had taken orders prior to the take over of the business by the Coades in 1769.
......................
The Stourhead Borghese Vase.
Height 1245 mm
It has no inscription.
It appears that although Pincot took the subscription it was actually supplied by Eleanor Coade sometime in 1772.
According to Kenneth Woodbridge (quoted in Kelly 1990, pp.
38 fn. 4, 386) a subscription payment to Daniel Pincot of £5.5.0 is recorded in
the Stourhead accounts of October 1770 (for what exactly Woodbridge does not
say) followed by a later payment to Eleanor Coade, for the sum of £12 14s 6d,
in May 1771. The F.M. Piper drawing of 1779 shows the vase in the Venetian Seat
which was demolished in the 1790s.
In Stourhead... Dudley Dodd note 58 p.293 clarifies this - Henry Hoare Ledger 1770 - 85 - 8th October 1770 'Do Pincot my sbn to ye Borghese vase in part £5 5s.
7 May 1772 Elnr Coade for a Borghese vase and packge' £12 14 6d.
The 1784 Coade Catalogue lists the Medici and Borghese Vases Height 4' 2" at £31 10s.
The Kedleston Coade Borghese Vase.
Given the indented mark I suspect that this might be a later cast
............................
There is no mention of the Coade's in Pincots Book of 1770.
https://catalog.hathitrust.org/Record/100899084
On 11 September 1771 Mrs Coade placed advertisements stating,
‘WHEREAS Mr Daniel Pincot has been represented as a Partner in the Manufactory
which has been conducted by him; Eleanor Coade, the real Proprietor, finds it
proper to inform the Publick that the said Mr Pincot has no Proprietry in this
Affair; and no Contracts or Agreements, Purchases or Receipts, will be allowed
by her unless signed or assented to by herself’ (Daily Ad, 11 Sept 1771, cited
by Valpy 1986, 215-6).
Three days later she anounced that Pincot was no longer employed by her.
Customers were to apply to her at Mr Demars, Bridge Head, Lambeth
Daily Advertiser (September 23rd, 1771), p.2.
The Manufactory at Kings Arms Stairs, Narrow Wall Lambeth,
lately conducted by Mr Daniel Pincot, is now under the
Superintendence of MR JOHN BACON, sculptor, whose Merit as an Artist being too
well known to need any ENCOMIUMS.
.......................
Matthias Diemar (1720 - 95) and Eleanor Coade.
extract below adapted from.
https://gunnis.henry-moore.org/henrymoore/sculptor/browserecord.php?-action=browse&-recid=790
In 1771 Eleanor Coade lodged with ‘Mr Demar’ (Diemer at ‘Bridge Head, Lambeth’, this was certainly Diemar’s address (Kelly 1990, 38, 43) (this info from Nancy Valpy who combed the Daily Advertiser (the complete run of the Daily Advertiser is in the Library of Congress, Washington).
see - ‘Advertisements for Artificial
Stone in the Daily Advertiser’, Nancy Valpy - English Ceramic Circle Transactions, vol. 12,
no. 3 (1986) pp. 206-226, pp. 209-216, 220-22.
He was born in 1720, the son of a Berlin gunmaker, Matthias
Diemar and had two brothers, Nathaniel and Benjamin, who became well-known
painters. Around 1760 Emanuel and Benjamin left Berlin, and by 1761 both were
exhibiting at the Free Society in London.
Over the two following decades
Emanuel exhibited wax portraits, landscapes, still-life and literary subjects
with the Society of Artists. In 1769 he gave his address as ‘opposite the
Lying-in Hospital, Westminster Bridge’ (Graves 1907, 77).
The Lying In Hospital est 1767 by John Leake was on the North Side of Westminster Bridge Road, Lambeth.
In 1770 Diemar was elected a fellow of the Society of
Artists and in 1772 a director. By 1776 he had taken a shop at 377 Strand, on
the north side between Carle Court and Maygold Court.
David Garrick - Wax medallion by E. M. Diemar. Private
Collection (E. J. Pyke, A Biographical Dictionary of Wax Modellers, 1973, p
39). Garrick frequently sat to ‘Demar, the wax modeller, who did hundreds of
profiles of him’ (J. T. Smith, Nollekens and his Times, ed. W. Whitten, 1920,
II, p 207).
In addition to his work as a wax modeller, Diemar was a
gunmaker and an engraver. A pair of signed flintlock pistols, which are
chiselled and engraved, survive in the Royal Collection.
In 1780 he published
The History and Amours of Rhodope, which had engraved drawings by Angelica
Kaufmann.
In 1783, he took out a Sun Insurance policy on his household goods
and stock valued at £800, giving his profession as gunsmith and printseller. In
1785 he moved to 114 Strand, London and issued an elaborate tradecard describing
himself as ‘Printseller and publisher’ (Guildhall Library, reproduced in
Blackmore 1989, 108).
Diemar clearly ran a prosperous concern for when his
insurance was renewed in 1791 the value of his stock and goods was £2,000.
In
his will, prepared in 1790, he left his estate to his widow Ann, who carried on
the business. His death on 24 April 1795 was announced in the Gentleman’s
Magazine. He was buried in the Lutheran church, Savoy, at a cost of £6.
The
will directed that ‘three days after my decease before I am buried my coffin be
filled up with hot rossin and immersed in plaister and afterwards interred in a
plain decent manner’ (PROB 11/1268 fol 678 in Blackmore 1989, 109).
Gunnis identified a second wax-modeller, John Emmanuel
Diemar. It seems likely that this was Emmanuel Matthias and that the confusion
is caused by inconsistent spelling in the exhibition catalogues of the Society
of Artists.
Literary References: Gunnis 1968, 130; Pyke 1973, 39;
Blackmore 1989, 105-142.
Diemer at the Society of Artists
....................................
It is interesting to note that Pincot was involved at least initially with the artificial stone gate piers made for Horace Walpole for Strawberry Hill.
Eleanor Coade had charged Horace Walpole £175 12s 10d for the gate piers
and Walpole considered this too much. By May 1772, they were in dispute, and
Walpole requested the investigation by Sir William Chambers. On 26 May 1772,
Chambers wrote brusquely to Coade, ‘Mr Walpole insists upon your choosing a
person to meet me in order to settle the dispute between you. Appoint therefore
whoever you think proper and I will Meet them at your house any evening about
five the beginning of next week.’
see - https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/1754-0208.12985
For more details on this dispute see below.
In 1771, right at the very beginning of her career at the
manufactory, Coade was insuring her utensils and stock for £1400 with the Sun
Assurance Company. Vol 206, policy 299458, cit. John Havill, ‘Eleanor Coade:
Artificial Stone Manufacturer Born Exeter 1733 and Died London 1821’
(unpublished PhD thesis, Exeter, 1986), p. 44.
Info from - Caroline Stanford
https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/1754-0208.12985
..................................
The Coade Manufactury - the Images.
Here is an attempt to gather all the known images of the Coade premises at Lambeth in chronological order.
....................
An unsigned drawing - it appears to show a sphinx and fountain figure in the Vestibule.
The wrought iron lamp and overthrow over the gate with the flanking Coade urns on piers is missing here
A later fountain figure, derived from Giambologna is at Stoneleigh Abbey.
Image from British Museum.
Presumably 1780/90's.
https://www.britishmuseum.org/collection/object/P_G-1-233
.......................................
Images from the London Picture Archive - used with permission.
Note the man posing with his arm leaning on a font (as in the Church at Debden) see further information and images of the font below.
There appears to be three versions of this drawing by different artists.
Charles Tomkins, JT Smith, and George Sheppard c. 1810.
The frontage was rebuilt at the same time as the Narrow Walls road was straightened - cutting through College Street which ran alongside the Coade works to the King's Arms Stairs on the River to become Belvedere Road.
...................................
Drawing signed on bottom right by illustrator, engraver and historian JT Smith (of Nollekens and his Times fame).
With a man leaning on the Debden/ Windsor type font.
British Museum.
.......................................
The Coade Manufactury with the Royal Coat of Arms over the Entrance.
Water colour drawing by Charles Tompkins.
Signed and dated 1801.
This drawing appears to show the legs of the statue of Polyphemus (illustrated below) which was later set up in the Westminster Bridge showroom before being sold to the Fonthill Estate in the sale of 1843.
Note the statue of Polyphemus which was retrieved from the Fonthill estate by Talisman Antiques of Gillingham, along with the small group of a male and female figure.
See the photographs and notes on the Poyphemus below.
It also shows a pair of leopards on rusticated plinths and a pair of Herm / Term type busts and a very large pair of female figures.
.
British Museum.
................................
Watercolour of The Yard of the Coade works.
George Sheppard undated.
Here illustrated is the Urn with the Floral arrangement which is used on the roof of the Royal Opera House Covent Garden.
The Covent Garden Coade Finial.
...........................
Soane Museum Drawing by Nash 1806.
Frederick Nash.
Their ref SM volume 146/105
An early 19th Century view prior to the rebuilding of the Front Entrance.
London Picture Archive.
The Rebuilt Frontage of the Coade works on Narrow Walls - Belvedere Road.
1828.
https://collections.soane.org/ARC15452
.............................
The Debden Church Essex Coade Stone Font, dated 1786.
A second font was set up in the Royal Chapel at Windsor.
and another at Milton Abbey Dorset (disappeared).
Believed to have been modelled by Robert Brettingham de Carle (1748 - 1791).
For much more on de Carle and his family see below.
A version perhaps the Milton Font was that sold by Christie's 16 April 1997 - lot 536.
https://www.christies.com/en/lot/lot-753310 (no image available).
A Font at Buckland Abbey Chapel, Devon has distinct similarities perhaps coincidental..
In the 1799 Catalogue for Coades Gallery it is described as
"No 41. 4 Gothic Font—from the original, executed for His Majeſty, and placed in St. George's Chapel, ft Windſor, alſo at Debden Church in
Essex; and at Milton-Abbey Dorsetshire ; round the lower part are eight Gothic
niches, containing the following statues from paintings by the late Sir Joshua Reynolds, for the grand window in New College, Oxford - 4ft. 10in. by 2ft.
4in".
The catalogue also notes the Gothic screen in the Bray chapel "so much admired for its lightness and the richness and the ricness of its groyned cieling with the arms casts etc were all executed by this manufactury for his manufactury in the year 1790".
The Bowl of the font is supported by cherubim heads, while its buttressed lower part
displays pedestal-supported statues emblematic of the Christian and Cardinal
virtues.
The latter figures of Temperance, Fortitude, Justice and Prudence were
derived from the Gothic chapel window of New College, Oxford, exhibited by
Thomas Jervase in Pall Mall, 1783, and executed after a composition by Sir
Joshua Reynolds.
The font pattern, designed for Mrs Eleanor Coade by the
architect Richard Holland (d.1827), was originally commissioned by R.M.T.
Chiswell for the St. George's Chapel at Debden Church, Essex.
The latter,
incorporating the Chiswell armorial shields, was inspected by King George III
at Buckingham Palace in 1786 and was discussed at the time in the European
Magazine.
Another font of this pattern was displayed at Coade's gallery in 1799
but, like the one recorded at Milton Abbey, Dorset, its present whereabouts has
not been traced. See A. Kelly Mrs Coade's Stone, Upton-upon-Severn, 1991,
pp.109-111.
see - Coade’s artificial stone in St George’s
Chapel’, Annual Report of The Society of Friends of St Georges and the
Descendants of the Knights of the Garter Ida Darlington, (1955) pp. 13-18.
.....................
The Image below from -
The Debden Church Font.
It does not have the foot section shown on the photographs of the Bray Chapel Windsor Font.
.........................
The St George's Chapel Windsor Coade Stone Font.
text here adapted from - the essay by Eleanor Cracknell (Assistant Archivist)
https://www.stgeorges-windsor.org/788/
A bill from Eleanor Coade dated 1790 shows that she was paid
£48 14s 4½ d for modelling a frieze for the Edward IV monument and a gothic
font in St George’s Chapel [SGC XIV/1790/7].
The font itself is described in
the 1799 catalogue of works of the Coade factory:
It had an octagonal base with “eight Gothic niches”
containing statues based on paintings made by Sir Joshua Reynolds “for the
grand window in New College, Oxford”. The figures represented Faith, Hope,
Charity, Temperance, Fortitude, Justice, Prudence and Life. “Faith”, in the
words of the catalogue, “standing fixedly on both feet, bearing the cross, the
symbol of her belief, has her eyes and hands raised to heaven – while Hope,
looking at the same heaven, appears springing forward to it so eagerly that her
feet scarce touch the ground; part of an anchor, her attribute, is shown in the
niche.”
The Joshua Reynold's West Window at New College Oxford - the Engraving of 1785.
Lettered below the image with the title in open letters, and
a dedication to Reverend John Oglander from the publisher, and "Painted on
Glass by Mr. Jervaise.", and "Painted by Sir Joshua Reynolds.
Publish'd Septr. 1st. 1785., by John Boydell, Engraver in Cheapside, London, Engraved by Richard Earlom.".
https://www.britishmuseum.org/collection/object/P_Aa-13-42
Another example survives at Debden in Essex, and apparently, when
a copy was shown in the Royal Academy, the King asked for it to be sent to the
Queen’s House (later Buckingham Palace) so that he and his family could look at
it at leisure. It was a piece in which the firm was particularly proud.
A photograph taken by John Harrington in 1872 shows this
font in the Bray Chapel, with an elaborate base of sheep’s heads and feet.
St John
Hope maintains that just 9 years later, it was broken up and buried underneath
the grand monument to the Prince Imperial.
The photograph taken in 1929 by Robert Burns Robertson, shows
the font still intact, although with some minor damage. It cannot then have
been, as described in the book Mrs Coade’s Stone by Alison Kelly, “smashed up for hard-core to
support the monument”. So where did it go?
A bill survives from George Fountain, stone mason, dated
1881, stating that he was paid “for moving the font from the Bray Chantry
Chapel to the South Aisle” [SGC XIV/1881/50]. So it was not broken up, but
moved to another position in the Chapel.
Just 6 years after this bill, Canon Anson gave money for a
font to be set up in the South Nave Aisle – the alabaster one which still
stands outside the Beaufort Chantry.
Perhaps the Coade one was unwanted, or
considered old-fashioned by this time, and the decision was made to bury it.
A.Y. Nutt, Chapter Surveyor from 1873 to 1912, states in his account books that
money was spent in August 1887 on “Materials for laying paving in chapel,
consequent on old font being buried“ [SGC XIII.A.8].
Whatever the reason, its rediscovery did not alter the
Chapel’s opinion on it and it suffered again when rather than reinstate it,
Robertson and his men reburied it “just inside and slightly to the east of the
South door”.
It may not have been destroyed in 1881, but it still came to
a rather ignominious end for what was once a celebrated part of the grand
restoration of the Chapel under the architect King.
Eleanor Cracknell (Assistant Archivist)
........................
The 1929 Photograph of the Windsor Font.
Excerpts from the 1799 Coade Exhibition List.
referring to the fonts.
The study of Coade's gothic productions requires a detailed essay of its own
but in the meantime -
The monument to Capt William Templer at Teigngrace Church,
dated 1805, is signed by Coade and Sealy.
The 10 Gothic Torcheres of 1810 from the Conservatory at Carlton House designed by Thomas Hopper.
A Coade and Sealey Summer House 1802 Brightling Park, East Sussex
St Mary's Church Langley Marish, Nr Slough.
South chapel screen in Coade stone added in1792 by Sir Robert Bateson Harvey with 3 tall
arches 2 columns deep, quatrefoil piers, quatrefoils in spandrels,
quadripartite vauting with shield bosses and wrought iron railings.
........................
A case study from the Georgian Period writer on Coade Caroline Stanford former historian of the Landmark Trust. I am quoting liberally from this article.
In Spring 1772 Mrs Eleanor Coade (jnr) diplomatically faced up to Horace Walpole in a dispute over the cost of a Gothick gateway in artificial stone for Strawberry Hill House, Twickenham and the architect William Chambers representing Walpole as a mediator provided an eye witness account of the Coade manufactory in Lambeth.
On 26 May 1772, Chambers wrote brusquely to Coade, "Mr Walpole insists upon your choosing a person to
meet me in order to settle the dispute between you. Appoint therefore whoever you think
proper and I will Meet them at your house any evening about five the beginning of
next week".
Chamber's report to Walpole on Monday, 8 June 1772, of his
visit to the Coade manufactory the previous Friday is the only known
eye-witness account of the manufactory’s working practice under Eleanor Coade.
Sir,
I spent a good part of the afternoon last Friday at the
stone manufactory in examining Mrs Coade’s claim upon you for the piers at Strawberry Hill. I
saw the model and she produced a letter from the maker (unidentified - was this Pincot or John Bacon?),
who I know and believe to be a man of character, by which it appeared, as nearly as she
could collect the time etc from his books, it had cost £25, but as neither Mr Whatley, her
friend, nor I thought it worth any such sum, we put it down at £16, which we thought the full
value of it and supposed that the remainder of the time etc might have been spent on other
things and charged by mistake to this article, or in making alterations of which we could
take no account.
We then saw the moulds, which are very formidable things, and we believed
not overcharged in the account any more than the quantity of the composition used: of the
price we are no judges, but supposed from the nature of the materials of which
it is composed and the method of preparing it that it must be worth as much as plaster; she has charged
something less for it. (an intersting aside and gives an idea of how costly plaster of Paris was at the time)
We then saw an account of the expenses of burning a kiln of goods, as
they call it, and it amounted to five guineas according to her book, but as there were some items
there we thought over-rated, we reduced it to four guineas, and upon inspection of the kiln,
or rather oven, we believed that the piers could not be burnt in less than four times’
firing.
The wages for modelling ornaments, moulding, and repairing
seemed to us incredible, but she produced a book, wherein a regular account of time was
kept which had all the marks of authenticity, from which we collected, I think, £52 of
the sum charged. The remainder was for work done before the commencement of the book, for
which there appeared no proofs, but we examined one of the men who had been
employed, and he said he began to work on the piers as soon as he came into the manufactory,
which was two months, we found, before the book was begun. We then examined some of
the manufacture just taken out of the moulds and compared it with what was finished,
and saw the method and difficulty of repairing it, which convinced us that the reparation was
a very tedious and expensive work, much more so than could be imagined by any who had not
seen it done. To conclude, we were mutually of the opinion that it had cost Mrs Co[a]de
upwards of £150 exclusive of profit etc. – as you will see by the enclosed state of the
account, but as she had offered to accept £100 rather than incur your
displeasure, we both declined fixing any sum and advised her to leave it entirely to your goodness to settle it as
you should judge reasonable. With regard to the repair, she is willing to put
up the one pinnacle that is wanting and the eight flowers without any expense to you, but if more should be
wanting she hopes you will consider it.
I am, Sir, etc
Chambers also enclosed an account of the costs, both as
declared by Coade (left) and as assessed by himself and Whatley after their visit (right):
Mrs Co[a]de’s charge
£sd 25 - Model etc £sd 16 - -
10 - 30 l[bs] plaster 10 --
55 - Moulds, cases, oil and lard 55 -
21 -- 31/2 ton composition 21 --
64 6 4 Wages 64 6 4
5 15 6 Putting up the piers 5 15 6
23 6 - Pincot’s attendance 12 12 -
Totals £175 12 10d ----------- £151 14 10d
The reference to Pincots attending in (1770?) and the reduction of his fee /wages is the last we hear of him at Coades before his dismissal - he died in 1797and is buried at Bunhill Fiels dissenters cemetary
In 1771 Pincot submitted a copy of the Borghese vase (1) for
exhibition at the Society of Artists. It was not displayed in the main
exhibition since it was not an original design but being ‘desirous of giving
every encouragement in their power to merit and ingenuity’ and ‘in
consideration of its being a very fine performance’ the committee allowed it to
be placed in the entrance lobby (Graves 1907, 199). He also solicited
successfully ‘for leave to place a vase of artificial stone, in the passage for
two days’ at the Royal Academy (Council Minutes, vol 1, fol 105, 13 April
1771).
For Caroline Stanford's short and enlightening talk on the subject of this dispute and Eleanor Coade's emergence as a leading business woman in the latter part of the 18th century until her death in 18
for a more in depth look see Caroline Stanfords excellent essay -
The timber merchant Kemble Whatley acted as a mediator for Mrs Coade in the dispute
The Strawberry Hill Gothic Gate Piers in the 1784 Catalogue.
https://bibliotheque-numerique.inha.fr/collection/item/35774-descriptive-catalogue-of-coade-s-artificial-stone-manufactory?offset=11
The Strawberry Hill Gate and Piers in 1822.
https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/789496
The Coade Gate Piers at Strawberry Hill.
John Buckler, 1770-1851.
..........................
View of the River Thames with the River Bank at Lambeth.
Kings Arms Stairs the wharf and entrance to the Coade manufactory.
Etching and aquatint.
"Drawn & Engrav'd by J. W. Edy / Publish'd Feby 17. 1791, by John Harris, Sweeting Alley, Cornhill & No. 8, Broad Street London"
J W Edy (1760 - 1820).
In the foreground, Westminster Bridge beyond, and Westminster Abbey and surrounding buildings on the opposite shore; in the foreground a number of people converse by the river bank, two boats close to shore, one with man and large basket of flowers, the other a ferry with four customers, another decorated barge moored, at far left the 'Artificial Stone Manufactory'. 1791.
Images below from the British Museum.
................................
Brief History of the Ownership and Management of Messrs Coade from 1769.
Eleanor senior nee Enchmarch was born in 1708 in Dorset and married George
Coade who died in 1769. She died in 1796.
Eleanor Coade jnr was born on 3 June 1733 in Exeter, the elder
daughter of the Baptist family of George and Eleanor Coade.
George Coade
(1706–1769) was a wool merchant originally from Lyme Regis, and his wife
Eleanor (Elinore, née Enchmarch) (c.1708–1796 was the daughter of Thomas
and Sarah Enchmarch (d.1735), merchants and textile manufacturers of
Tiverton, Devon. Eleanor's younger sister Elizabeth was born 1738 in Exeter.
Eleanor's maternal grandmother Sarah Enchmarch was a
successful business woman in Tiverton, running the family textile business for
25 years after her husband Thomas died in 1735. Mrs Enchmarch employed 200
people making cloth. In 1749, with revenues from her business, she re-built the
Enchmarch mansion.
About 1760, following George Coade's bankruptcy, the Coade
family moved from Exeter to London. By the mid-1760s, daughter Eleanor Coade
was running her own business as a linen draper in the City of London.
The wool trade was in decline, and in April 1759 notification of
George Coade’s bankruptcy appeared in the Gentleman’s Magazine. He reappears in London
in 1762, when he was elected, for one year only, a Fellow of the Society
for the Encouragement of Arts and Sciences, when he was living at Charterhouse
Square.
It is fair to suggest that his wife and two daughters, then in
their mid to late twenties, came with him to London, for by 1766 Eleanor was
describing herself as a linen draper who dealt in linen-based textiles and insured stock worth £200 with the Sun
Assurance Company, living in Charles Square and storing her stock in
nearby Shoreditch.
That her business was growing - the insurance
valuation raised from £200 to £750 in just one year (fact check this!) this included plate and wearing apparel in her apartment in the delling house at 21 Little St Thomas Apostle Street in the City of London when her father George Coade died that year, after having been declared bankrupt
for the second time.
........................
Samuel (d.1808) and George Coade d.1769 his wife Eleanor I died 1796-
Their daughter Elizabeth died in 1765.
https://archive.org/details/bim_eighteenth-century_letter-to-the-right-hono_coade-george_1758/page/n1/mode/2up
There is some evidence that both Coade ladies had run their own linen and drapery business before embarking on the new artificial stone business at Lambeth.
Eleanor Coade I and her daughter then aged 36 would have been unlikely to afford the
purchase of the Pincot business, it follows that they must have recieved financial assistance from someone.
There are at least two possible options for
her sonsors/benefactors - her grandmother, Sarah Enchmarch, of Tiverton and her uncle, Samuel Coade.
It might be instructive that in 1784 Samuel Coade left the property (then called Bunters Castle) above the town of Lyme Regis (later Belmont) to Eleanor Coade and forgave her debts to him in his will of 1808. TNA, PROB-11-1479-244.
https://www.landmarktrust.org.uk/globalassets/3.-images-and-documents-to-keep/history-albums/belmont-history-album.pdf
Daniel Pincot was the probable vendor of 138 lots, catalogued as
'The Year's Produce of Artificial Stone Manufactory' at the newly opened Pall
Mall auction rooms of James Christie on 22 and 23 December 1767.
In 1769 Eleanor Coade Snr bought the Artificial Stone Manufactury from Daniel Pincot at Narrow Walls in Lambeth. Given the bankruptcy of her husband it is as yet unclear how she raised the money.
It is not clear what the relationship between the Coades mother and daughter and Pincot was but they were Dissenters.
Pincot worked briefly with her as manager at the Narrow Walls - it seems that John Bacon had accompanied him from the manufactory at Goulston Square, Spitalfields to Lambeth shortly beforehand.
In 1770, Daniel Pincot, describing himself as an
“Artificial Stone Manufacturer,” published an essay on the “Origin, Nature,
Uses, and Properties of Artificial Stone” (fn. 129) and stated that he had
recently opened a factory “ by King's Arms Stairs, Narrow Wall, Lambeth,
opposite Whitehall Stairs.” A plan of the Jesus College property made in 1770
(fn. 60) shows Daniel Pincot as tenant of a piece of ground north of College
Street and fronting on Narrow Wall.
avaiable on line at https://archive.org/details/essayonoriginnat00pinc/page/n3/mode/2up
In
1771 the Coades dismissed him and appointed the sculptor John Bacon as the
supervisor. It seems possible that Pincot had been moonlighting or supplying his own objects after joining forces.
On 11 September 1771 an advertisement appears which states:
‘WHEREAS Mr Daniel Pincot has been represented as a Partner
in the Manufactory which has been conducted by him; Eleanor Coade, the real
Proprietor, finds it proper to inform the Publick that the said Mr Pincot has
no Proprietry in this Affair; and no Contracts or Agreements, Purchases or
Receipts, will be allowed by her unless signed or assented to by herself.’
At first, Coade pieces were stamped ‘COADE’, or, for a
period in the 1780s to 1790s, ‘COADE'S LITHODIPYRA’.
In 1784 Eleanor Coade took over the lease of Belmont, Lyme Regis gifted to her by her uncle Samuel Coade
https://www.landmarktrust.org.uk/globalassets/3.-images-and-documents-to-keep/history-albums/belmont-history-album.pdf
The frontage was embelished with many of the products from the Coade Manufactory - the keystone over the front door is inscribed Brabam 1785.
When Mrs Coade was not in Lyme, she sometime let the house out through the summer. The Bath
Chronicle for 29th June 1792 included the following advertisement:
‘TO LETT, furnished for the Summer and afterwards disposed
of, that genteel and well-built house, situated near the top of the
Hill at the Westend of the Town near the Sea, the property of Mrs Coade, known
by its elegant artificial stone front, from her Manufactury at
Lambeth. The House contains two parlours, drawing-room and six bedrooms,
surrounded by a shrubbery and garden, with coach-house and stables; likewise
convenient grass for horses.’
In 1799 she took on as
partner her cousin John Sealy (1749 - 1813), and the firm became Coade & Sealy until his
death.
After the death of John Bacon (7 August 1799) John de Vaere (1755 - 1830) who had been working for Wedgwood until 1795 was appointed chief designer at around this time.
The Coade Gallery Handbook was published in 1799.
After the death of Sealy she then appointed William Croggon, a remote relation, to be her
manager.
The Croggon work books from 1813–21 survive. [PRO, C.111/106] The firm's
stamp, which had been ‘COADE & SEALY’, reverted to being ‘COADE’.
On
Eleanor Coade's death in 1821, William Croggon purchased the business and traded
successfully, doing much work for Buckingham Palace, until 1833.
He then went
bankrupt, probably through £20,000 worth of work left unpaid by the Duke of
York, and died in 1835. The Duke was building a new house in London but also had a reputation for never making any payments to his tradesmen and had in fact died £200,000 in debt. (needs fact checking).
In 1828 William Croggon obtained from the authorities of Jesus College a new lease of his premises in Belvedere Road for 9½ years at a rent of £140 a year.
The ground is described as approximately 195 feet from east to west and 85 feet from north to south.
The plan on this page shows the site in 1804 before the formation of Belvedere Road, and on Plate 38a is a view of the Narrow Wall and frontage at about the same date on which the curved line of Narrow Wall and of the path running towards the river by the side of the factory, can be clearly seen.
Considerable alterations took place, just before Croggon got his lease, to improve the new frontage to Belvedere Road.
At the Duchy of Cornwall office is a water colour drawing by Buckler made after the alteration. It shows that the old house was altered and adapted, but not entirely rebuilt.
There are a few pieces which have the Croggan mark but his
management only lasted until 1837 when the lease was turned over to
Danforth & his new business partner,
Thomas Routledge. Together they ran the terracotta and scagliola works manufacturing tiles, and also producing small numbers of Coade stone ornaments until 1840. But they
couldn’t make it pay either and the factory closed.
It appears that no pieces dated later than 1840 exist, though the moulds were not sold until 1843.
............................
The information below from The Ceramic Art of Great Britain Lewellynn Jewitt pub. 1878.
https://www.gutenberg.org/files/73875/73875-h/73875-h.htm
“The information got from the fire-man that worked at the
Artificial Stone Manufactory, Lambeth:—There is three kilns, the largest is 9
feet diameter and about 10 feet high, the other two are sizes under; they have
only three fire-holes to each, and they are about 14 inches in the clear.
They
make use of no saggers, but their kilns are all muffled about two inches thick,
which was always done by this fire-man. They always was four days and four
nights of fireing a kilns, and the moment the goods are fire’d up he always
took and stop’d the kilns intirely close from any air whatever without lowering
the fires at all. He has been use to fire intirely with coal (which are call’d
Hartley coals—they are not much unlike yours at Derby). He never made use of
any thermometer, but depended intirely on his own knowledge. The composition
shrinks about half an inch in a foot in the drying, and about the same in the
firing. A great deal of the ornaments are 4 inches thick when fired, and he has
fired figures 9 feet high. This man has had the intire management of building
the kilns, setting and firing them for many years; his wages was one guinea per
week, and for every night when he fired he had 2s. 6d. for the small kiln, 3s.
for the next size, and 3s. 6d. for the largest.
“Sir,—Quite unexpected, the fire-man from Lambeth that I
have been after so long, call’d on me on Monday, to say that he was out of
imploy; therefore I engaged him to meet me at Field’s in the evening, which he
did; and inclosed is all the information I cou’d get from him. I informed him
that when I wrote to him in the country I was imploy’d to look out for a person
in his way, but did not know wether there was now the same person wanted or
not, but wou’d write. At the same time I ask’d him if he shou’d like to go down
into the country to make a trial for a short time, and see how he was likely to
succeed; but this he seem’d to decline for some time, unless he went upon a
certainty for constant imployment. After drinking a bowl of punch, he said he
wou’d go down to make trial, in case his expences was all paid up and down, and
paid for the time he was away. He seems to think, before he cou’d attempt doing
any thing, there must be some alteration made to the kiln; but of this you will
be the best judge, if you agree to have him down. He seems pretty confident
they will be glad to have him back to Lambeth again very soon: in short, he
thinks they cannot do without him. He says they had better a made him a present
of £500 than a parted with him. I have been inform’d thro’ another hand that
had use to work at the manufactory they have had very great losses in the kilns
since he left, and that they have lost everything in the large kiln. He seems
very confident in succeeding in firing China figures to any size; but of this
he cannot be a judge till a trial is made. After I first see this man, I went
and inform’d Mr. Vulliamy of it, and his advise is to for you to have him down,
tho’ he says he is a drunken bad chap, but clever in his business. If you
shou’d so determine to have him down, I think sooner the better, as he expects
soon to be call’d to Gen. Conway’s again, and likewise to fire some
figures, &c., for a Mrs. Dimer, in town. He has promis’d to call again
in a few days, therefore you will please to give your answer. Mr. Vulliamy very
much wants two boys of the last mould sent: begs you will forward them
immediately. Mr. V. inform’d me a few days since that he would write to you the
first opportunity, and am,
“Sir, your very obedient servant,
“J. Lygo.”
“March 23rd, ’90.”
.................................
In 1792 the following letter, also in my own possession, was
addressed to William Coffee by Miss E. Coade, and shows what a clear-headed,
right-minded, and well-disposed employer she was:—
“Lyme, 25 July, 1792.
“Mr. Coffee.—I received your third letter, but have had so
many engagements that I cou’d not answer it sooner; besides that at this
distance I can’t speak upon it as if I were present. I supposed, as you now
say, that Mr. Pritchard’s information against you was in consequence of some
quarrell you had had with him; but I do not justify his manner of taking
revenge, and you are now returning it upon him by acquainting me of his making
tools in my time and selling them, which, as you say, is a greater crime than
what he has charged you with, and if Mr. Sealy knew it, I can’t suppose he
wou’d keep such a man. But it is always a rule with me to let every man speak
for himself if he can; and, therefore, as I am at such a distance I must put it
by for ye present, or else refer it to Mr. Sealy, who is ye only judge whether
ye hurry of business will allow of parting with a man or not. You shou’d put
yourself in ye place of a master, and then consider how many things they have
to try them, and how impossible to attend to ye private quarrells of ye
workmen: however, I know Mr. Sealy is disposed to do justice. You say he
behaved very well to you in ye beginning of this affair, and if he changed his
conduct, it must be in consequence of your improper behaviour to him. But as it
is too late to recall what is past, my advice to you is to do as you say—return
to your work; and if you are conscious that in your passion you have behaved
disrespectfully to Mr. Sealy, make such acknowledgments to him as will show
your good sense, as well as a sense of duty. I have no doubt but he would have
lent you money if you had asked it in a becoming spirit. I hope your hand is
better and that you are at work. And wishing you may improve this accident to
your own good, I remain
“Your sincere friend,
.......................
The first Coade Trade Card.
Probably printed before the death of Strahan.
Printmaker: Wray, P. Draughtsman: Ryley, Charles Reuben (Possibly after)
Trade card of Coade, with the goddess Hestia, keeper of hearth and home, with a lit torch in
one hand fending off Chronos, the Greek personification of Time, who is
attempting to seize a sculpted figure personifying Sculpture and Architecture
(as signified by the pair of compasses in one hand and a set square in the
other).
In the background a sculpture of the Three Graces on a Corinthian
composite capital in the kiln.
These are the only known images of the Coade Kilns.
Etching and stipple.
Image from the British Museum.
https://www.britishmuseum.org/collection/term/BIOG195726
William Strahan (24 March 1715 – 9 July 1785) was a Scottish printer and publisher, and a politician who sat in the House of Commons between from 1774 to 1784. He was succeeded by his son Andrew.
He was a correspondent and later a good friend of Benjamin Franklin.
By 1770 he owned the biggest printing operation in England, comprising three separate printing businesses in six buildings.
..........................
The Coade Catalogue of 1784.
London, Printed:: To be had at the Manufactory, and of J. Strahan, Bookseller, No. 67, Strand. -, M,DCC, LXXXIV. [Price One Shilling].
The title plate is signed as engraved by R. Wray. Other
plates are not signed.
Some of the engravings are dated 1773 onward.
The catalogue contains 778 entries: vases, fireplaces,
capitals, friezes, medallions...;
A complete version is available on the excellent website of the Bibliotheque Nationale, France.
https://bibliotheque-numerique.inha.fr/collection/item/35774-descriptive-catalogue-of-coade-s-artificial-stone-manufactory?offset=11
The Yale Centre for Bitish Art have slightly mutilated copy available in high resolution -
https://collections.britishart.yale.edu/catalog/alma:9932847843408651
Another copy although in less resolution is available on line from the British Museum Collection
https://archive.org/details/bim_eighteenth-century_etchings-of-coades-art_coades-artificial-stone_1779/page/n67/mode/2up
The Soane Museum has a copy - not available on line
https://collections.soane.org/b9139
The Royal Academy has a copy formerly propert of John Yenn. not available on line
https://www.royalacademy.org.uk/art-artists/book/coades-lithodipyra-or-artificial-stone-manufactory-for-all-kinds-of-statues/marc
Here is a small selection of the engravings.
................................
The Coade Gallery Catalogue of 1799.
.........................
The Trade Card pasted onto the soft front cover of the Yale Catalogue.
Hestia wears a band carrying the legend: "Ignea
vis" (‘the power of fire’) and above the kiln in the background "nec
edax abolere vetustas" (from Book XV of Ovid's "Metamorphoses"
'And now my work is finished, which neither the anger of Jove, nor fire nor
sword nor the passing years shall devour’).
Images - British Museum.
A Later Trade Card (post 1800) printed after the Establishment of the Coade Gallery in Westminster Bridge Road, Lambeth.
Strahan - 67 Strand.
William Strahan (24 March 1715 – 9 July 1785) was a Scottish
printer and publisher, and a politician who sat in the House of Commons between
from 1774 to 1784. He was a correspondent and later a good friend of Benjamin
Franklin. He sat for Joshua Reynolds.
The business was tsken over after his death by his son Andrew (1749 - 1831).
...............................
The William Croggan (Late Coade and Sealey) Trade Card (post 1820).
Printed after the purchase of the business by Croggan in 1820
.............................
.......................................
The Entrance to the Coade Gallery of Sculpture
at Pedlar's Acre on Westminster Bridge Road, Lambeth
From the European Magazine Vol. 41. 1802.
Here we see the caryatids as used on the porch at Schomberg House, Pall Mall.
The group on the frontage illustrated here was re erected on the Croggan premises on the New Road, the corner of Hampstead and Euston Road, Euston. Disappeared.
See the illustration below.
.................................
The Coade Polyphemus from the grotto by the lake at Fonthill.
Originally in the Coade Gallery at the Manufactory in Narrow Wall image below of 1801.
shown in the Water colour drawing by Charles Tompkins. Signed and dated 1801.
see - Fonthill Recovered... Professor Caroline Dakers pub. UCL 2018 available on line -
https://www.ucldigitalpress.co.uk/Book/Article/68/92/5083/
It appears in the 1799 catalogue where it was to form the ‘coup de theatre’ at the new Coade Gallery by Westminster Bridge Road, Lambeth with a fulsome description in the visitor’s guidebook of 1799 - but if the signed and dated watercolour by Tompkins is to be believed it was still in the Narrow Walls premises in 1801.
"this stupendous design is conceived at the moment when Polyphemus discovers, from the summit of the rock, the nymph Galatea with his rival Acis, upon whom, in his fury, he hurls a fragment of stone, and kills him. This work occupies a space of 20 feet in height by 12 ft in width, the Polyphemus is a statue of 10 ft. 6 ins, a cave is formed in the rock, at the entrance of it lays the Acis and Galatea, much larger than life.
see the crop from the watercolour above.
.........................................
The Coade Lion and Tiger (in the watercolour above).
This tiger sold at the Dunsborough Park sale by Christie's - Lot 50 - 20 June 2013.
The Tiger is illustrated in the book of Coade's etchings which
correspond to those listed in the 1784 Descriptive Catalogue of Coade's
Artificial Stone Manufactory, Section I, Statues, p.4, No.59, Tiger, £8/8/0d.
Alison Kelly, discusses a Tiger and its Companion
in Tehidy Park, Cornwall which have since disappeared.
According to Mrs Coade in
her Gallery handbook, the Tiger, sitting up like a cat, was modelled from life
by John Bacon, the Coade Manufactory's principle modeller and designer. The
model cost 8 guineas and sat about 3ft 6ins high..
The Coade List of 1799.
They say provenance Alton Towers.
I saw this piece in the garden of Hugh Kennedy at Acton Round, Bridgnorth, Shropshire in the nineties.
............................
Extract from the Somerset House Gazette 1824.
The reference to Acis and Galatea and Polyphemus.
These statues were sold to JB Papworth for James Morrison and erected at the Fonthill Estate in Wiltshire after 1843.
Acquired from the Rushworth & Jarvis auction of the
stock of the Coade Artifcial Stone Manufactory, Lambeth on 23 July 1843, by architect J.B. Papworth, (d. 1847) on behalf of James Morrison (d. 1859), for 16 guineas and subsequently
removed to The Pavillion, Fonthill Estate, Wiltshire, and thence by descent from James Morrison to his
great, great, great grandson.
Alastair Morrison, 3rd Baron Margadale, from whom along with a small group of Acis and Galatea acquired by
Talisman Antiques of Gillingham.
In their wisdom the smaller group of Acis and Galatea were sold separately! When I learn't of its existance I contacted Talisman with the history of the figures - somehow my input was never recognised - but I'm not bitter!
It is possible that the missing vandalised fragments are still in the lake at Fonthill - the head of Poyphemus would be a fantastic discovery.
https://www.christies.com/en/lot/lot-5838449
"On 20 July 1843, J.B. Papworth, architect and designer to James Morrison
('the richest commoner in England’), advised him of several lots in a sale of
the stock of the Coade Artifical Stone Manufactory that was to begin the
following day, 21 July 1843, by Rushworth & Jarvis, and of the suitability
of ' Polyphemus Acis and Galatea’ for the Pavilion at Fonthill, Morrison’s
preferred summer retreat.
'At Coade’s in the Belvedere Road there are works that would
suit your objects – some for indoor and some out. ... The Polyphemus Acis and
Galatea in the third days sale – this will probably be sold for a small sum –
for its taking down removing & repair will be a considerable draw back to
biddings for it – The Giant would certainly perform well over the covered way
at the Landing, Fonthill & the Acis & Galataea [sic] in the Cavern of
the Rookery".
Quote below from Christies Catalogue entry -
-The cluster of grottos located around the serpentine lake or
'river’ in the grounds of the Pavilion had been commissioned by Alderman
Beckford in circa 1749; the grottos had excited the imagination and works of
his son, William, but by Morrison’s tenure were virtually in ruins (T. Mowl,
'Inside Beckford’s Landscape of the Mind’, Country Life, 7 February 2002, p.
60).
Papworth created a grand landing stage on the east side of the lake that
led to the first of three grottos, which is presumably the landing refered to
by Papworth in his letter to Morrison of 20 July 1843. Interestingly, the
architectural historian, Timothy Mowl, describes what may be the present
figure, and another figure, probably Galatea, on a visit he made to the grottos
in the late 20th century, 'Relics of some abandoned garden project by the
Alderman, half-finished stone statues, a naked god and a broken nymph they lie
there in the dark’ (op. cit., p. 62).
The figure was perhaps designed by John de Vaere (d. 1830)
possibly in circa 1798-99 when de Vaere was active with the Coade manufactory. It was not mentioned in the Coade
catalogues of 1784. In 1799 John Bacon died, who had been the chief designer and supervisor of the firm
from 1771.
Bacon was replaced by de Vaere who is cited in the new
guidebook, '[de Vaere] is now constantly engaged at the Manufactory in its
various branches of statuary &tc.’ (Coade’s Gallery, 1799)
In 1787 de Vaere was employed by Josiah
Wedgwood to make models from the Antique under the supervision of the sculptor,
John Flaxman, R.A. (d. 1826), an experience which would have ably equipped him
for the role at Coade.
The Fonthill Polyphemus Leg.
35 in. (89 cm.) high; 26 in. (66 cm.) deep.
Christie's say modelled by Stephen Pettifer but it appears to me to be the original leg!
https://www.christies.com/en/lot/lot-5694138?ldp_breadcrumb=back
sold at The Dunsborough Park sale.
...........................................
A 19th Century Danish terracotta of Polyphemus.
Biscuit porcelain tinted in imitation of red terracotta.
Marked "P. Ipsen, Kjøbenhavn. Eneret" and number
"406" (?).
Height: 47 cm. Width: 11 cm. Depth: 21,5 cm.
Produced by the P. Ipsens Enke factory founded in
Copenhagen, Denmark by Peter Ipsen (d.1860) in 1843.
The factory enjoys international success with its
reproductions of the great models of ancient Greek and Roman sculpture.
The company won awards at international exhibitions and
opens boutiques in its name in Paris and London at 110 New Bond St.
For the very comprehensive Ipsen Catalogue of 1886 in German see -
https://www.kb.dk/e-mat/cop/pamphlets/dasmaa//pamphlets-dasmaa-2012-jul-smaatryk-object64287.pdf
This statuette was almost certainly based on the Coade original sold at auction in 1843 and gives us some idea of how the 10 tall statue originally appeared.
The lack of the third eyeball but the appearance of the eye socket in the middle of the forehead is interesting.
Who knows - it might be possible to have the missing pieces modelled and united with the torso!
see -
Fonthill Recovered... Caroline Dakers.
https://www.ucldigitalpress.co.uk/Book/Article/68/92/5083/
Page 40 from the Ipsen Catalogue of 1885
It is conceivable that the original composition came from the original painting by Pompeo Batoni
see -
Fonthill Recovered... Caroline Dakers
https://www.ucldigitalpress.co.uk/Book/Article/68/92/5083/
The closest I can find source for the design of this group is the painting by Pompeo Batoni of 1761.
and the subsequent engraving.
National Museum of Stockholm.
Sold 23 May 1780, Lot 43 by AJ Paillet and subsequently in 1868 Druot
The engraving below shows that the original by Batoni was with Jacques-Laure Le Tonnelier (1723–1785), Bailli de Breteuil,
who was the Knights of Malta’s ambassador to the Holy See in Rome from 1758 and,
subsequently, to the French court from 1778.
The Engraving after Batoni dedicated to Comte de Thomond.
Thomond was an Irish soldier Charles O'Brien, 5th Viscount Clare, 9th Earl of Thomond (1699 - 1761).
The British Museum has an engraving of the pair to the painting by Batoni by Laurent Pécheux of Nessus, Hercules and Daniiera engraved by Francesco Bartolozzi but not the Polyphemus.
....................................
Drawing is in Museu Nacional del Belas Artes. Rio de Janiero, Brazil.
Sheet of three Studies for Pompeo Batoni's Polyphemus - Royal Collection.
https://www.rct.uk/collection/906731/figure-studies
The Batoni in turn appears to be derived from Annibale Carracci's frescoes of Polyphemus, located in the
Galleria Farnese in Rome (painted between 1597 and 1607).
"This stupendous design is conceived at the moment when
Polyphemus discovers, from the summit of the rock, the nymph Galatea with his
rival Acis, upon whom, in his fury, he hurls a fragment of stone, and kills
him.
This work occupies a space of 20 feet in height by 12 ft in width, the
Polyphemus is a statue of 10 ft. 6 ins, a cave is formed in the rock, at the
entrance of it lays the Acis and Galatea, much larger than life".
..................................
Catalogue of the surplus and splendid collection of
sculpture, in Coade's imperishable stone, comprising a magnificent colossal
group of Polypheme with Acis & Galatea, Apollo Belvidere, Gladiators,
Venus, ... and a great variety of other works; also about thirty excellent
marble chimney pieces, ... which will be sold by auction, by Mr. W.R. Croggon,
on the premises, Palace Row, New Road, opposite to Tottenham Court Road, on
Wednesday, July 30, 1834, and following day, at twelve o'clock, by order of the
proprietors, who, in consequence of the above premises being disposed of, are
removing to their Manufactory Belvidere Road. Lambeth.
..........................
London Museum Drawing. Croggan in the New Road (Euston Road).
William Croggon was succeeded by his son Thomas John Croggon
in 1836.
Inscribed in pencil at bottom: 'Manufactory for "Coades Artificial Stone", corner of the Hampstead and Euston Roads nearly opposite Tottenham Court Road, 4 doors from the Adam and Eve public house.'
https://www.londonmuseum.org.uk/collections/v/object-94452/manufactory-for-coades-artificial-stone/
.........................
The End.
The Auction of 21 July 1843.
As far as I am aware no Austen and Seeley statue of a River God has reappeared.
But it is interesting to note that the moulds went to Austen and Seeley rather than Blashfield or Blanchard.
...............................
Messrs Blanchard and Artificial Stone.
Mark Henry Blanchard was born at Portsea, Hampshire and
christened on 30 August 1817. He was apprenticed at the Coade Factory in
Lambeth in the firm's declining years, probably when it was managed by Thomas
John Croggon between c.1835-37, or after the business had been let to Thomas Routledge
and John Danforth Greenwood 1837 and lasted until 1840.
Blanchard commenced business in
Blackfriars Road, Lambeth shortly after 1840 (probably working initially in plaster)
and then appears to have acquired some of the Coade Factory's moulds when
Routledge and Greenwood consigned them at auction in 1843.
Note the continued use of a varient of the Coade engraving in Blanchards promotional material (below) and the mention of John Bacon as designer.
..........................
A Map of Lambeth of the Mid 18th Century.
......................................
Site of the Coade Manufactory in 1746
The land on which the Coade manufactory was built (just North of College St) appears to show sevral ponds. but with a buildig fronting on to Narrow Wall
..................
Crop from John Roque's Map of London of 1746.
The land on which the Coade manufactory was built (just North of College St) appears to show sevral ponds.
............................
Lambeth cropped from Horwood's Map of London of 1799.
Showing the land leased by George Biggin from Jesus College and sublet to various manufacturers.
.........................
Fadden's (A later re printed and edited version of the Horwood map of London) 1819.
No mention of Coade but still shows the Artificial Stone Manufactory.
The new road now cuts through College St.
There appears to be a back entrance to Coades via College St and thus relatively easy access to the wharf at Kings Arms Stairs.
....................
Plan of the Coade Manufactury.
Size of the plot - 84 x 133 ft. Strangely no sign of a kiln.
This plan showing four engaged columns on the front doesn't appear to relate to the other images of the Coade manufactory at Lambeth shown on this post unless the works were rebuilt in the last phase of the manufactory.
Until more evidence appears it should be treated with suspicion.
............
College St, Lambeth.
View looking towards the river and the wharf at King's Arms Stairs.
C. 1890.
No 1 on the corner is the The White Hart public house on the south side of College
Street, seen on the right, and Belvedere Road.
This area was extensively damaged in World War II and
redeveloped for the Festival of Britain in 1951, which was followed by the
South Bank Development.
College Street and the Coade and adjoining premises has since been replaced by Jubilee Gardens.
It is an urban myth that the Coade works are buried underneath the Festival Hall.
......................
The Jesus College Plan of 1804, which was annotated in 1828 after the fire.
It shows the route of the new street (Belvedere Road) cutting through College Street.
Coade and Sealey's works are on the top left corner (with later annotation Croggan)
Jesus College, Oxford. Ref SU.2/18.
Currently the highest resolution I can obtain (from Georgian Group Journal 2016 - Caroline Stanford).
I will endevour to obtain an highter resolution image in due course.
The shore at Lambeth was an important location, with
craftsmen on hand to renovate the large ornate barges that were rowed by a team
of skilled oarsmen. Repairs were constantly needed for these important vessels.
In addition, intricate carving had to be maintained and often gilded.
A famous location was Searle’s Boatyard which was situated
on the shore just above Westminster Bridge, on the Lambeth side of the Thames.
The family boat- and barge-building concern of George
Searle, at Lambeth, was in existence from about 1763 until the late 1820s. A
‘Mr Searle’ is known to have bought the old Skinners’ Company barge as late as
1858 and converted it for Queen’s College, Oxford, to be used as a houseboat.
.....................
Belvedere Road, Lambeth.
Laid out in 1814—27 Belvedere Road had previously been called Narrow
Wall with Ragged Row to the South. It included the area of the Hopes which was west of Hungerford Bridge and
owned by Jesus College, Oxford from 1685.
It included Theobald's Dock and
Chambers' Dock and an open ditch on the east side as well. It was partly leased to
members of the Cupers family. The area where the Coade manufactory was located was y the College to
Part of Ragged Row was developed as Belvedere Crescent along with much else of the area.
Evidence of the factory's activity was unearthed when the
Festival of Britain site was being cleared. A rough granite bed, with a square
central hole, was displayed on the sloping grass bank in front of the Royal
Festival Hall.
........................
Trade Card of Robert Brettingham de Carle (1748 - 1791).
An ink inscription on the reverse suggests 1791?
Stangate St, Lambeth.
Stangate Street and Stangate Wharf were immediatly South of Westminster Bridge Road.
Image courtesy British Museum.
Sculptor and modeller, baptised in Norwich on 17 July 1748,
one of a family of stonemasons and builders, based principally in that city.
His father, Robert de Carle I, was a bricklayer, and of his known brothers,
John de Carle (1750–1828) was a marble mason and builder and Robert de Carle II
(bap. 1761; d. 1837), a stonemason.
It is thought that he was named after his paternal
grandmother, who was probably a sister of the architect Matthew Brettingham. (This needs to be fact checked).
While still a young man, Robert Brettingham
de Carle moved to London.
In 1783 he exhibited a portrait of a child (no 368) at the Royal Academy.
In 1785 he exhibited three works, including a wax portrait
of a lady, at the Royal Academy, giving his address as Stangate Street, Lambeth
On 18 Feb. 1774, he married Ann Davy at St George, Hanover
Square.
In the following year he produced what may be the earliest of a group
of salt-glazed stoneware jugs, at one of the Lambeth potteries, this, a harvest
jug, is inscribed with the name of his mother-in-law, also Ann Davy, and her
village, Yoxford (in Suffolk). Two more jugs, both dated 1781, are inscribed
with the names of botanists, William Curtis (in Hampshire County Museum) and de
Carle’s brother-in-law, James Sowerby (in the Victoria and Albert Museum).
For
his only appearance at the annual Royal Academy exhibitions, in 1785, he
contributed three portraits (two in wax) from the address in Stangate Street,
Lambeth.
By about this date he was working with the Coade artificial stone
manufactory, at Narrow Walls Lambeth only a few hundred meters away.
Two signed works by de Carle in Coade stone are known, both
from 1786: a font (designed by the architect Richard Holland) in St Mary the
Virgin and All Saints, Debden, Essex, and a lunette with a relief depiction of
three putti around a funerary urn bearing a portrait roundel of his
mother-in-law, fitted int to the stone headstone over her grave in St Peter’s churchyard,
Yoxford.
His last known work is a Coadestone coat of arms, erected in September
1792 above the entrance to the Norwich Shawl Manufactory in Colegate, Norwich.
“the very elegant coat of arms
placed over the [Norwich] shawl manufactory…is a composition of Coade’s
artificial stone manufactory, Lambeth, and the modelling exceuted by the
deceased Mr Robert De Carle, a native of this city and son of Mr De Carle of
this place (Norwich Chronicle 1792).
After
Robert Brettingham de Carle's death in London on 7 February 1791, he was described in the Press as ‘the
first artist of the Artificial Stone manufactory’ and ‘an eminent modeller,
whose skill was unrivalled’ (Norfolk Chronicle, 12 Feb 1791; Bury Post, 16 Feb
1791).
For more on the very successful de Carle family of builders and masons of Norwich and Bury St Edmunds see -
https://tmwfamilyhistory.info/philip-barnes-elizabeth-de-carle/
https://suffolkinstitute.pdfsrv.co.uk/customers/Suffolk%20Institute/2014/01/10/Volume%20XL%20Part%204%20(2004)_The%20de%20Carle%20family%20stonemasons%20of%20Bury%20St%20Edmnds%20Sylvia%20Colman_466%20to%20479.pdf
.........................
The Memorial to Anne Davy at Yoxford with a Coade Stone Panel.
Norwich born Anne Davy who died in 1786 aged 72. Carved limestone headstone with fine lettering and semi-circular Coade stone panel depicting a carved classical urn with putti and a scroll draped over an anchor.
The scroll reads ‘death is swallowed up in victory’. On the urn is an oval panel containing a bust which is believed to be of Anne Davy. The left-hand figure holds up a coronet to the portrait set within the urn.
The panel is signed by Richard Brettingham De Carle who was Anne’s son in law.
De Carle
was a relative of the architect Matthew Brettingham (Matthew Brettingham’s daughter having married a De Carle). RB De Carle is known to have worked at the Coade factory in Lambeth. The earliest known Coade stone memorial is at Winterborne Strickland in Dorset and dates from 1782.
......................................
An important brown stoneware jug by Robert Brettingham De
Carle, dated 1781.
John Samuel Clack
Bonhams Knightsbridge British and European Ceramics and Glass
Lot 295. 18 May 2016.
Catalogue entry by John Sandon which I have drawn on extensively here.
https://www.bonhams.com/auction/23557/lot/295/an-important-brown-stoneware-jug-by-robert-brettingham-de-carle-dated-1781/
Only a small number of de Carle's wares are recorded, characterised
by fine quality modelling in high relief, turning what was a utilitarian brown stoneware
into a luxury product.
The earliest recorded example is a harvest jug of
different form inscribed 'R B De Carle/ Inv T & Fecit/ London/ 1775' and
bearing the names 'Anne Davy' and 'Yoxford', See Sampson and Horne Exhibition Catalogue 2009, p.30.
This
lot is one of three recorded jugs of the same basic form.
One in the Victoria
and Albert Museum lacks the cottage and church vignettes and is illustrated by
Robin Hildyard, Browne Muggs (1985), pp 46-47. It was made for the botanist
James Sowerby, believed to have been married to De Carle's sister.
Another is in
the Hampshire County Museum and is illustrated by Oswald, Hildyard and Hughes,
English Brown Stoneware (1982), p.59 and was made for another botanist, William
Curtis.
This also lacks the vignettes and has a different spout, said to be a
caricature of Greaves, the colourist. It is also dated 1781 and is accompanied
by a matching goblet.
Both Sowerby and Curtis were major influence on British
pottery and porcelain decoration in the late 18th and early 19th century, their extensive botanical prints used as a source by many makers.
Presumably, De Carle knew
them both, his East Anglian origins and his association with leading botanists
of the time being sources for his business.
.......................
The V and A de Carle Jug of 1781.
Jug, salt-glazed stoneware, modelled by Robert Brettingham
de Carle for the botanist James Sowerby, Lambeth, 1781.
James Sowerby was born on 21 March 1757, in the City of
London; he died at No. 2-3 Mead Place, Lambeth, on 25 October 1822. He was the
son of John Sowerby, a carver of inscriptions (which might be significant), and his wife Arabella Goodspeed.
https://collections.vam.ac.uk/item/O150995/jug-brettingham-de-carle/
For a useful potted biog of James Sowerby (1757 - 1822) (of Mead Place Vauxhall) see
https://vauxhallhistory.org/james-sowerby-1757-1822/
...........
The son of James Sowerby and his wife Anne de Carle was baptised James de Carle Sowerby (1787 - 1871).
Anne
Brettingham De Carle (1764-1815) was the wife of the English naturalist and
illustrator James Sowerby (1757-1822). She was an illustrator in her own right.
Together with a cousin, James founded the Royal Botanic Society
and Gardens, Regents Park and was its secretary for 30 years.
For a brief partnership with Edward Lear see - https://www.christies.com/lot/lot-lear-edward-and-james-de-carle-4256527/?
His brother George Brettingham Sowerby (1788 - 1854) was the second son of James Sowerby - he was educated
at home under private tutors, and afterwards assisted his father in the
production of illustrated works on natural history. On the latter's death in
1822, he and his brother James De Carle Sowerby continued their father's work
on fossil shells, publishing the latter parts of the Mineral Conchology of
Great Britain.
see also The Sowerby Collection (1739 - 85).
https://discovery.nationalarchives.gov.uk/details/r/637931bf-8dcc-4477-ad76-9b33871efa82
.............................................
James Sowerby - Trade Card, c. 1786.
at no 2 Mead Place Lambeth.
British Museum.
I suggest designed and engraved by Sowerby.
Inscription content: The mount is inscribed '1786', the date
of Banks' acquisition, which is presumed to be inscribed in ink on the
pasted-down verso. Lettered with artist's name, address and details: 'Natural
history, portraits, &c:'
According to the ODNB, Sowerby was gifted his Lambeth house
by his father-in-law on his marriage in 1786, suggesting this card, acquired by
Banks in 1786, was made that year.
https://www.britishmuseum.org/collection/object/P_D-2-3223
For Sowerby's Portrait of Daniel Solander 1784 see -
https://www.britishmuseum.org/collection/object/P_Q-3-107
........................
Another de Carle Jug formerly with Sotheby's.
Lot 240.
Height 22.3 cms.
Dated 1783 within a cartouche of wheat and barley, signed R. B. De Carle, Fect. on a simulated metal strap across the base of the handle, incised Lambeth underneath the base
...................
Another de Carle Jug with BBR Auctions.
Dated 1781 with initials DRA.
5.3" tall.
Lot 376 - 15 Feb. 2005
................................
The de Carle family some notes -
Robert Brettingham de Carle 1748 - 1791.
John de Carle 1750-1828.
Benjamin de Carle 1788-1864.
Robert de Carle II 1761-1837.
Robert de Carle III 1785-1829.
Mary de Carle 1792-1866.
Robert de Carle IV fl 1795-1842.
The (Huguenot?) de Carle family worked principally in Norwich though
they, or perhaps another branch of the family, also ran workshops elsewhere in
East Anglia.
Robert Brettingham, John and Robert II were brothers; John was the
father of Benjamin, Robert II was the father of Robert III and the latter
married Mary de Carle, née Lock.
Robert IV’s kinship to the other family
members is not clear, but he practiced in Bury St Edmunds and was at some stage
in partnership with Benjamin.
..............................................
of Further Interest -
Ref Pottery and Ceramic production at Lyme Regis.
https://www.lymeregismuseum.co.uk/lrm/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/7_pottery_and_brick_industry_in_lyme.pdf
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