Samuel Walldin and Sir Henry Cheere in Winchester Cathedral’, the Georgian Group Journal, Vol
George Saumarez Smith, ‘Samuel Walldin and Sir Henry Cheere in Winchester Cathedral’, The Georgian Group Journal, Vol. xxIII, 2015, pp. 65–74
text © the authors 2015 SAMUEL WALLDIN AND SIR HENRY CHEERE IN WINCHESTER CATHEDRAL
GEORGE SAUMAREZ SMITH
he main subject of this article is the work of a TWinchester stonemason, Samuel Walldin, and its similarity to that of a highly successful London sculptor of the mid eighteenth century, Sir Henry Cheere. But before introducing these two characters it will be important to establish the context of funerary monuments in Winchester Cathedral during the Georgian period. In modern descriptions of Winchester Cathedral, the eighteenth century is usually dismissed as a period of little change and limited interest.¹ There were however a large number of classical monuments built there from the Restoration up to the accession of William IV which, taken as a group, provide a clear and comprehensive illustration of the heroic age of English sculpture. They also tell us much about the relationship between the leading sculptors in London and their more provincial counterparts. For the purposes of this article, the study of classical monuments in the Cathedral can be bookended by the construction of Inigo Jones’s choir screen around up to its eventual removal Fig. . Monument to Bishop Willis (d. ) and replacement in . Jones’s grand Composite by Sir Henry Cheere. façade could be the subject of an article in itself, but its history has already been well documented in the Winchester Cathedral Record . It is important to Of a similar date to the Inigo Jones screen is the remember, however, that throughout the Georgian monument to Richard Weston (d. ), the Lord period this screen stood in a central position in the High Treasurer of England, in the Guardian Angel’s Cathedral and would have lent the interior a much Chapel at the far east end of the Cathedral. Designed more classical character than we see today. by the French sculptor Isaac Besnier, it shows how
THE GEORGIAN GROUP JOURNAL VOLUME XXIII SAMUEL WALLDIN AND SIR HENRY CHEERE IN WINCHESTER CATHEDRAL
Italian Mannerism passed through France to Cheere was the leading English sculptor and England at the court of Charles I. With a recumbent monumental mason of the mid eighteenth century. bronze figure modelled by the Italian sculptor Born in , he was apprenticed to Robert Francesco Fanelli, the Weston monument was a Hartshorne in and began his own business in strong statement of continental taste, later described , at first and until in partnership with Henry by Pevsner as ‘the most progressive and one of the Scheemakers. He made his name with several grand finest monuments of that time in England’. monuments in the s, with a particular emphasis The construction of funerary monuments on the use of different coloured marbles, and built gathered pace after the Restoration when the rules of up a large workshop in Old Palace Yard in burial changed. Up to that time Cathhedral burials Westminster. He had numerous assistants and from had been reserved almost entirely for bishops and the s his work became more variable in quality, kings, but new laws allowed anyone with sufficient much of the work being carried out by his assistants. status and wealth to be buried there . The fees due His drawing for the Willis monument is now in the depended on location: the most expensive area was at V&A Drawings Collection (Fig. ). The annotations the east surrounded by the tombs of Anglo-Saxon are of particular interest, Cheere identifying the cost monarchs. Thus Sir John Clobery, MP for Winchester of the monument as ‘ £ Cariage Excepted’ [sic]. and a prominent general, was buried close to the east The materials are also specified, with ‘Purple’ for the end in the s and commemorated with a proud, if column shafts and ‘Dove’ for the panel behind the rather pompous, classical monument by the Leicester- figure. The monument is from the earlier phase of born sculptor Sir William Wilson. Cheere’s career, characterised by a mixture of the By the early eighteenth century funerary Baroque and the Classical that had been brought monuments were becoming more numerous, and from Flanders by Michael Rysbrack and Peter some of the smaller chapels had begun to be Scheemakers. The design confirms the particular appropriated for family burials. In the Nicholas influence of Cheere’s business partner Henry family chapel off the south transept, the monument Scheemakers, bearing a strong resemblance to his to Warden Nicholas of was signed by William monument to Sir Francis Page (d. ) in Steeple Woodman, a London sculptor who also signed two Ashton Church, Oxon. monuments in Westminster Abbey. The s and At this time Cheere was much in demand for s saw a shift towards monuments more ambitious producing portrait busts, characterised by their in scale and decoration. Bishop Peter Mews had died attention to detail in the modelling of drapery. As in and was commemorated with a small well as portraiture, commissions for sculptors in this Corinthian aedicule in the Guardian Angels Chapel. period came from two other sources: funerary In contrast is the large and sumptuous monument to monuments for churches and cathedrals; and marble Bishop Willis, who died in , in the south aisle of fireplaces for grand houses. As the century the nave (Fig. ). Willis is shown at rest, reclining on progressed, funerary monuments and fireplaces a veined black marble sarcophagus looking towards began to share certain characteristics and many the heavens, his arm supported on a pile of books monuments resemble fireplaces mounted high up on and a cushion. Tall Composite columns, their shafts the wall. The main difference in design was that a in single pieces of pavonazetto marble, rise to either monument needed some form of visual and physical side to support a pediment. The monument is support at the base. prominently signed on the base of the figure by From earlier in the eighteenth century, wall Henry Cheere. monuments had usually been supported by a shelf
THE GEORGIAN GROUP JOURNAL VOLUME XXIII SAMUEL WALLDIN AND SIR HENRY CHEERE IN WINCHESTER CATHEDRAL
with a shaped panel underneath whose profile resembled the outline of pendant swags or drops, often supported by winged cherubs. As a design challenge it had no direct classical precedent and had been evolved to solve a specific problem associated with wall monuments: that of an architectural composition appearing to float or hang in space. James Gibbs was the only English architect who had really tackled this problem in print: his Book of Architecture , published in , showed numerous funerary monuments including several designs for wall tablets with a shaped substructure. In the late ’s Henry Cheere developed a distinctive design for the supports of wall monuments that became a visual trademark for his workshop (Fig. ). It consisted of a central semi- ellipse with an acanthus scroll beneath; to either side were concave sweeps leading to squared pendant blocks supported by upright stylised flowers. Further curved sweeps on either side led up to the main shelf support, sometimes also supported by short console brackets. In the centre there was space for a shield, often painted with a family coat of arms, strung with garlands of fruit and flowers or decorated with palm fronds. This very particular type of wall support appears in a drawing in Fig. . Design for a monument to Richard Willis, Cheere’s hand for a Design for the Monument to Bishop of Winchester by Henry Cheere. George Carpenter (d. ) at Owslebury near © ( Victoria and Albert Museum, London. Cat. Ref. . ) Winchester (Fig. ). During the s and s this form of wall support became prolific and widespread, being found as far afield as the Kings Chapel in Boston, Massachusetts, and most monuments of this date with this design are attributed to Cheere’s workshop or to his pupils. On this basis a brief look at the wall support of the monument to Catherine Eyre (d. ) in the Chapel of St Alphege in Winchester Cathedral might certainly suggest Cheere’s authorship; it is signed, however, by a local mason called Samuel Walldin. Walldin was the younger son of a farmer, also Fig. . Wall support typical of Henry Cheere’s workshop called Samuel Walldin. Born in , he was c. –. (drawing by the author ) apprenticed aged sixteen to a Winchester
THE GEORGIAN GROUP JOURNAL VOLUME XXIII SAMUEL WALLDIN AND SIR HENRY CHEERE IN WINCHESTER CATHEDRAL
Fig. . Design for a Monument for Lord Carpenter Fig. . Monument to Thomas Knollys (d. ), (d. ), drawing by Henry Cheere. St Boniface, Nursling, Hants. (© Victoria and Albert Museum, London, Cat. Ref. . ) stonemason called John Blake but did not take up his freedom until thirty years later. Little is known of his life during this period but we can get some sense of his training by looking at his first signed works. The earliest of these is the Knollys monument of in St Boniface, Nursling near Southampton (Fig. ). This is in the form of a wall tablet, enclosed by an architectural framework similar to a door surround or fireplace and sitting on a shallow block decorated with a Vitruvian scroll or wave pattern (Fig. ). The tablet is framed by an architrave which springs at the bottom from stepped scrolls, similar to those Fig. . Detail of monument to Thomas Knollys, frequently used by Cheere. At the top the architrave St Boniface, Nursling, Hants.
THE GEORGIAN GROUP JOURNAL VOLUME XXIII SAMUEL WALLDIN AND SIR HENRY CHEERE IN WINCHESTER CATHEDRAL
Fig. . Monument to Catherine Eyre (d. ), Fig. . Monument to William Eyre (d. ), Chapel of St Alphege, Winchester Cathedral. Chapel of St Alphege, Winchester Cathedral. has stepped shoulders supported by small console brackets hung with swags of flowers. In the centre the architrave steps up to meet the underside of the cornice, and is filled with crossed palm fronds. Above this the cornice is broken to form a pediment, surmounted by a flaming circular urn. The original black painted border is still visible on the surrounding stonework. The design of the upper part might remind us of a plate from one of Batty Langley’s pattern books, as well as the influence of James Gibbs. The newest innovation is in the base of the support, of the type used by Henry Cheere’s Fig. . Detail of monument to William Eyre (d. ), workshop, which is made in black slate. Chapel of St Alphege, Winchester Cathedral.
THE GEORGIAN GROUP JOURNAL VOLUME XXIII SAMUEL WALLDIN AND SIR HENRY CHEERE IN WINCHESTER CATHEDRAL
The monument to Catherine Eyre in Winchester The central tablet is framed by inlaid pilasters, Cathedral, designed a year later, has obvious behind which is laid an elliptical arch and keystone. similarities (Fig. ). Again it is in the form of a wall Two half-pilasters are tucked to either side, springing tablet, surrounded by an architrave which is stepped from stepped scrolls. The pediment is broken, this at the top and bottom. In the centre the architrave is time with a shield at the centre; the monument is again raised, and filled with a shield flanked by mounted low on the wall and it may have been palms. The cornice is again broken, this time to form decided that the shield was more prominent in this a broken pediment with a flaming urn at its centre. position. The base support is inlaid with yellow The monument is made in different coloured Siena marble overlain with white marble palm marbles, pavonazetto and orange-brown brocatello fronds, with foliate scroll brackets either side to being mixed with grey-veined white. As already support the shelf above (Fig. ). Again the design has noted, the base has the characteristic profile derived strong similarities to Henry Cheere’s work, not only from Cheere’s workshop, on which there is a in the wall support, but also in its general design signature: ‘S Walldin Fecit’. which closely resembles another drawing attributed In the same chapel and slightly later in date is to Cheere in the V&A drawings collection (Fig. ). Walldin’s signed monument to another member of It is tempting to speculate how Walldin became the Eyre family, William, who died in (Fig. ). familiar with Cheere’s work; might he perhaps even This is also made in coloured marbles, with a have worked in Cheere’s workshop in the late s. mixture of brocatello, siena, dark grey and white. His name does not appear as one of Cheere’s
Fig. . Drawing attributed to Henry Cheere. ( © Victoria Fig. . Monument to Dean Thomas Cheyney (d. ), and Albert Museum, London , Cat. Ref. . ) Winchester Cathedral.
THE GEORGIAN GROUP JOURNAL VOLUME XXIII SAMUEL WALLDIN AND SIR HENRY CHEERE IN WINCHESTER CATHEDRAL apprentices, but there does exist a gap in these The similarities in design between Walldin and records between and . He appears to have Cheere’s wall supports gives us a particular problem spent most of his life in or near Winchester; he signed of attribution for the unsigned monument to Dean the Knollys monument ‘S : Walldin, Winton’ in Cheyney, who died in . Positioned near William and we know from the county records that he lived at of Wykeham’s chantry chapel, it is mounted in the this time in Hyde, a part of Winchester just outside south aisle of the nave and is arguably the grandest the Roman city. His name does not appear again in wall monument in the whole Cathedral. It is in the the county records until , when he took on a yard form of a giant oval plaque surrounded by a wreath in Staple Chambers, not far from the Cathedral. The of palm branches, and is full of allegorical illusions following year he succeeded Richard Leversuch in (Fig. ). Against the brocatello marble background the official post of Cathedral Mason, for which he was are set two seated figures – Faith carrying an anchor paid an annual retainer. This involved carrying out and a book, and Prudence with an hourglass and routine repairs to the fabric and in he also snake in hand – flanking a square urn inlaid with red carried out repairs to Winchester Palace. In he Jasper marble. An oval panel shows a sarcophagus was described as ‘an eminent stonemason of this city’ being opened by Religion to liberate the soul of the and by he was referred to as ‘an architect in deceased, whilst an angel in the clouds sounds the Winchester’. This shows not only how far his career last trumpet. Above a phoenix, the symbol of had progressed but also the overlap that still existed immortality, rises to the heavens. At the bottom of at this time between masons and architects. the monument, underneath the tablet, is a shaped
Fig. . Detail of monument to Dean Thomas Cheyney (d. ), Winchester Cathedral.
THE GEORGIAN GROUP JOURNAL VOLUME XXIII SAMUEL WALLDIN AND SIR HENRY CHEERE IN WINCHESTER CATHEDRAL
Fig. . Monument to Jane, st Lady Rodney (d. ), Fig. . Monument to Villiers Chernocke (d. ), St Mary the Virgin, Old Alresford, Hants. Winchester Cathedral.
panel inlaid with Siena marble that very closely and numerous consoles, swags and garlands. Whilst resembles the wall support of Walldin’s monument this is a good example of Cheere’s later style, one can to William Eyre (Fig. ). Is it possible that the also trace the origins of its composition back to the Cheyney monument is by Samuel Walldin? monument to Matthew Prior of in Westminster To answer this question we need to look at Abbey, designed by James Gibbs and carved by another recorded work by Henry Cheere near Rysbrack. On the Prior monument, illustrated in Winchester, a monument that Walldin must surely Gibbs’ Book of Architecture , a sarcophagus is flanked have known. This is in the church at Old Alresford, by standing figures of two of the Muses, above which Hampshire to Jane, first Lady Rodney (d. ) a bust is enclosed in a circular niche surmounted by (Fig. ). Here a central sarcophagus is flanked by a pediment carried on console brackets. two allegorical figures, those of Faith and Hope. The If the Rodney memorial suggests Cheere as the character of the monument is strongly Rococo, with more likely author of the Cheyney monument, we bold use of coloured marbles (breccia, brocatello) need to look next at another large wall monument
THE GEORGIAN GROUP JOURNAL VOLUME XXIII SAMUEL WALLDIN AND SIR HENRY CHEERE IN WINCHESTER CATHEDRAL
The upper part of the monument is pyramidal in form, although the sides of the pyramid start vertically before abruptly becoming tapered. At the centre is an urn, to either side of which are two standing allegorical figures: Charity surrounded by children and breast-feeding a baby, and Justice who is blindfolded and carrying a sword. To the right a tree rises and bows over the figures in the form of a weeping willow, a familiar motif for funerary monuments of this date. This must have been a major commission for Walldin, and is his only signed work in the Cathedral to include figures. It has obvious similarities to the Cheyney monument opposite, and perhaps we might conclude that it was produced as Walldin’s response to Cheere’s earlier work to show that he was equal to the task. In truth he had found his limits: the composition is rather awkward, and the Chernocke monument lacks the charm and vigour of Dean Cheyney’s. The pyramidal form of the Chernocke monument was to be used again by Walldin for a group monument to the Rivers family dating from around (Fig. ). A large rectangular wall tablet records Fig. . Monument to the Rivers Family, the names of several members of the Rivers family, to Epiphany Chapel, Winchester Cathedral. either side of which are slender console brackets in profile. The tablet sits on a shelf supported by short console brackets, applied to a slate block of rather square shape. At the top is a stocky pyramid of facing it across the Cathedral from the north aisle, Bardiglio marble, onto which are laid several coats of signed by Samuel Walldin, to Sir Villiers Chernocke arms hanging from tied ribbons, and arranged like a who died in (Fig. ). This is of a similar scale family tree. This monument is signed by Walldin on to the Cheyney monument but is entirely the underside of the base support. monochrome, made in white marble set against a In addition to Walldin’s five signed works in the ground of dark grey veined Bardiglio marble. The Cathedral, there are several others that can be composition is divided in two vertically. The lower attributed to him on stylistic grounds. In his official part is based around an oval tablet, above which is a capacity as Cathedral Mason, it seems likely that he segmental pediment. To either side are semi-oval would have received other commissions and would plaques which stick out from behind slender console also have been responsible for the fixing of new brackets. The wall support has a shallow curved monuments onto the walls. Both the Chernocke and profile to the base which, together with the other Rivers monuments were topped with pyramids, and curves, form a roughly continuous oval. there are two further pyramidal monuments which
THE GEORGIAN GROUP JOURNAL VOLUME XXIII SAMUEL WALLDIN AND SIR HENRY CHEERE IN WINCHESTER CATHEDRAL must surely be Walldin’s: that of Katherine Pool in the two published books on the Cathedral’s (d. ) and of Anne Morley (d. ). A further monuments. It would be wrong to make him out to monument in the Eyre family chapel, to Richard Eyre be an undiscovered genius; it is fair to say that in the who died in , is stylistically identical to that of context of his age, his work was competent but Mary Eyre whose monument was signed by Walldin. unremarkable. What his career does show us, Samuel Walldin died in and was buried in a however, is the provincial practice that existed in tomb chest in the churchyard of St Bartholomew, parallel to the work of the major sculptors of the Hyde, near other tomb chests that might well have period, and how important such local figures were in been made in his yard. In his later years he had been the shaping of our churches and cathedrals. in financial trouble and had moved out of Winchester to the nearby village of Sparsholt. Towards the end of his career his works must have seemed somewhat outdated; the fashion was moving ENDNOTES away from colourful monuments towards those of . John Crook, Winchester Cathedral (Andover, ), more sombre design. The greatest of these in pp. – . J. M. G. Blakiston, The Inigo Jones Screen, Winchester Cathedral, John Flaxman’s monument to published in two parts in Winchester Cathedral Joseph Warton (d. ), belongs to an entirely Record, Nos. and (Friends of Winchester different world from Cheere and Walldin, being Cathedral, and ), pp. – and – made entirely in milk-white marble and much more . M. Bullen, J. Crook, R. Hubbuck and N. Pevsner, directly inspired by the sculpture of Greek and The Buildings of England: Hampshire : Winchester Roman antiquity. and the North (New Haven and London, ), p. Neo-classicism in the Cathedral was to be . John Vaughan, Winchester Cathedral, Its Monuments relatively short-lived, and by the ’s there was a and Memorials (London, ), p. growing air of disapproval of its eighteenth-century . John Physick, Designs for English Sculpture monuments. Chief amongst the voices of dissent was ‒ (London: Her Majesty’s Stationery John Britton in his History and Antiquities of the See Office, ), p. . Margaret Whinney, Sculpture in Britain , – and Cathedral Church of Winchester ( ), in which (London, ), pp. – he regretted ‘that our venerable Cathedrals should, . Rupert Gunnis, 3rd edition edited by Ingrid for so many ages, have been disgraced and disfigured Roscoe, A Biographical Dictionary of British by petty and pretty monumental tablets’. His Sculptors, ‒ (New Haven and London, harshest words were reserved for the Inigo Jones ), p. screen, which was dismissed as ‘a bad and an . M. I. Webb, ‘Henry Cheere, Henry Scheemakers and the Apprenticeship Lists’ , Burlington unsightly object’; only a few years later it was Magazine , April , pp. – removed and replaced with a dull Gothic Revival . Roscoe, op. cit. , p. screen designed by the new Cathedral architect . I am grateful to David Rymill at The Hampshire William Garbett. County Record Office for his assistance in tracing Samuel Walldin was the most prolific mason records of Samuel Walldin’s property and finances. . Vaughan, op. cit. ; G. H. Blore, Notes on the working in Winchester Cathedral during the monuments of Winchester Cathedral (Friends of Georgian period, yet his name does not appear at all Winchester Cathedral, )
THE GEORGIAN GROUP JOURNAL VOLUME XXIII