The Townesends of Oxford: a Firm of Georgian Master-Masons and Its Accounts’, the Georgian Group Journal, Vol
Howard Colvin, ‘The Townesends of Oxford: A firm of Georgian master-masons and its accounts’, The Georgian Group Journal, Vol. x, 2000, pp. 43–60
text © the authors 2000 THE TOWNESENDS OF OXFORD: A FIRM OF GEORGIAN MASTER-MASONS AND ITS ACCOUNTS
HOWARD COLVIN
he place of the Townesends in Oxford’s almost entirely from the archives of the Oxford colleges Tarchitectural history has been well-known since who were their principal clients, plus those of the , when W.G. Hiscock, the assistant librarian of Radcliffe Trustees and the first Duke of Marlborough. Christ Church, published an article about them in At Cambridge too it is the college archives which the Architectural Review . Though over anxious to reveal the Grumbolds as the leading builder-architects see William Townesend as Hawksmoor’s equal as an there from about until Robert Grumbold’s death architectural designer, Hiscock established his in . Elsewhere the records of government offices, importance as the great mason-contractor of Georgian municipal and ecclesiastical corporations and the Oxford, and, rather less clearly, as the architectural aristocracy have provided most of the information understudy of Dean Aldrich and Dr George Clarke. that we have about the other great English master- More came to light in the University volume of the builders of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, Victoria County History , published in , and the such as the Strongs of Taynton, the Bastards of state of knowledge about the Townesends and their Blandford, the Smiths of Warwick, the Fitchs of work was summarised in the successive editions of London, the Patys of Bristol. The only major family my Biographical Dictionary of British Architects of Georgian builders whose own papers were known ‒ , first published in the same year. More to have survived into the twentieth century were the recently David Sturdy has prefaced his study of the Staffordshire Trubshaws, but theirs were unhappily firm of Knowles, who took over the Townesends’ dispersed in the s, and only a few stray fragments business in , with an account of the latter which of them have since come to light. has the great merit of treating them primarily as A careful reader of Hiscock’s article of might, builders rather than attempting, like Hiscock, to however, have noticed that in modestly disclaiming emphasise their role as architects. Architects, of any finality in his discoveries, he excused the ‘short- course, they were from time to time, but building was comings’ of his paper by ‘the present inaccessibility their livelihood, and it was as mason-contractors that of certain archives and drawings’. The drawings were they made their fortunes during the great Oxford evidently those in Dr George Clarke’s collection at building boom of the early eighteenth century, in the Worcester College, where he may well have found course of which they were engaged in major works at the Librarian, Col Wilkinson, not as helpful in giving twelve of the nineteen colleges then in existence, access to them as I and others were to find Wilkinson’s besides being joint mason-contractors for the successor Richard Sayce. As for the ‘archives’, there Radcliffe Library and at Blenheim Palace, where they is reason to think that they were the Townesend built the Kitchen Court. family papers, of whose existence he became aware, Up to , when the Knowles accounts start, what though he never saw them. A substantial body of we know about the firm has hitherto been derived Townesend papers had, in fact, survived in the
THE GEORGIAN GROUP JOURNAL VOLUME X THE TOWNESENDS OF OXFORD : A FIRM OF GEORGIAN MASTER - MASONS AND ITS ACCOUNTS possession of a family connected with the Townesends in , and was still working under him at Exeter by marriage. Geoffrey Webb was given access to them College in ‒ , but by ‒ he was in , when he was editing Vanbrugh’s letters, but undertaking substantial works at Corpus and Christ found little in them to his purpose, and since then Church while his father was engaged at Blenheim, no other architectural historian has seen them. and he appears thereafter to have been running an Essentially the collection, which is still in private independent business. John’s engagement at hands, consists of accounts. There are no drawings, Blenheim came to an end in , but he was still letters or contracts. There is one pocket-book which sufficiently active to take his last apprentice in at contains a few jottings by John Townesend ( ‒ the age of , and to serve as Mayor of Oxford in ) in connection with a visit to London; there is a ‒ . One account book bears the name of John’s notebook that records that the same John Townesend younger son George, who established himself at has disclaimed any privilege as a member of the Bristol, but it is concerned exclusively with minor Oxford society of masons; and there are some papers work done in Oxford early in his career. relating to the executorship of William Ives (d. ), From business records of this sort very little an Oxford mercer whose wife was a Townesend. All information of a personal kind can be expected to the rest are accounts of one sort or another kept by emerge. The costs incurred by John Townesend on John Townesend, his elder son William ( ‒ ), his election as an Alderman of Oxford in , and his younger son George ( ‒ ), and his grandson entered in his day-book, are perhaps worth noting: John ( ‒ ). Of these there are some volumes , they amounted to £ s. d., and included payments extending in date from to . Four of them to the ‘the ringers’, ‘the musek’ and ‘the masebarer’ are ‘Day Books’, which record miscellaneous jobs and s. ‘for a Gowne’. His term of office as Mayor in currently in hand. One of these was kept by John ‒ involved further expenditure on a traditional Townesend for the years ‒ , the other three ‘venison feast’ and other customary obligations. There by William for the years ‒ , ‒ and ‒ , is, however, an intriguing entry in John Townesend’s those for the intermediate years being lost. Nearly all day-book that indicates that as a young man his son the other accounts belong to major undertakings William went abroad to France: ‘Recd. of Mr. Stevens such as Queen’s College Library ( ‒ ), the for picktuer that Will wass to buie in France £ s. Fellows’ Building at Corpus Christi College ( ), d.’ The entry is not dated but the journey is likely Peckwater Quadrangle at Christ Church ( ‒ ), to have taken place after the Peace of Ryswick in the Robinson building at Oriel ( ), and the Kitchen September and before the outbreak of the War Court at Blenheim ( ‒ ). There are two accounts of the Spanish Succession in /, by which time relating to stone from the Headington quarries, and William was in any case back in Oxford working at several for the Radcliffe Library, which mostly Exeter College. Now in March Edward, son of duplicate the accounts kept by the Radcliffe Trustees, Edward Strong, one of the chief master-masons published by the Oxford Historical Society in . engaged in building St Paul’s Cathedral and an Some of these accounts are neither very neatly nor Oxfordshire quarry-owner well-known to the very systematically kept, both ends of the book being Townesends, was in France at the start of a often used in a somewhat confusing manner not continental tour with Sir Christopher Wren’s son uncommon in the eighteenth century. Christopher. Then aged , Strong was William The accounts throw no light on the business Townesend’s exact contemporary, and it seems relationship between John and his son and successor highly likely that in sending his own son to France, William. William had been apprenticed to his father John Townesend was following the elder Strong’s
THE GEORGIAN GROUP JOURNAL VOLUME X THE TOWNESENDS OF OXFORD : A FIRM OF GEORGIAN MASTER - MASONS AND ITS ACCOUNTS example: indeed, it is conceivable that William may Most of the accounts relate to buildings with have accompanied the other two young men for part which the name of Townesend is already associated, of their journey. What he saw or did in France we and in Oxford itself they add only very minor works do not know. Bearing in mind the distinction made to the established list: summerhouses at Corpus in the Queen’s College accounts between John ( ), Christ Church ( ‒ ) and New College Townesend the mason (‘Lapicida Townesend’) and ( ), of which only the last survives (Fig. ) ; and his architect son William (‘Architectus Townesend’), the delightful hood over the door of the Principal’s we may perhaps suppose that the visit played some Lodgings at Jesus, made by John Townesend himself part in the latter’s education as an architect. The in (Fig. .). To the vexed question of the purchase of a picture does at least suggest that in authorship of the design of such buildings as Queen’s France he had contacts with artists. College Library and the Fellows’ Building at Corpus,
Fig. . Summerhouse in Warden’s garden at New College, Oxford, built by William Townesend in . Howard Colvin.
THE GEORGIAN GROUP JOURNAL VOLUME X THE TOWNESENDS OF OXFORD : A FIRM OF GEORGIAN MASTER - MASONS AND ITS ACCOUNTS the Townesend papers contribute very little. Not journeys to London, and in August (by which once are the names of Aldrich, Clarke or time the building was in progress), £ s. ‘for a Hawksmoor mentioned, and that of Vanbrugh only Jorny to Cambridg’. It is idle to speculate about in a note to the effect that at Blenheim the funnels of Townesend’s purpose in visiting London, but his the chimneys in the Kitchen Court were to be trip to Cambridge must surely have been to inspect ‘considered by Mr. Vanbrook for pargeting’. To Wren’s recently completed Library at Trinity College, the making of architectural designs by the Townesends the grandest building of its kind in England, and one themselves there are very few references, but it is of which (as Celia Fiennes was to note) was in some interest that in his accounts for building Queen’s sense the model for the one at Queen’s. College Library, John Townesend should have Outside Oxford there are a few buildings which charged £ ‘for a ground plot of the Colleg as it now can be given to the Townesends for the first time on is’ (December ), and £ ‘for a ground plot of the the evidence of their accounts. Only two of these are Colleg if new modaled’, a reminder that the idea of a of any consequence: Compton Beauchamp House in general rebuilding of the college was in the air some Berkshire and Cirencester Park in Gloucestershire. time before it became a reality in the early years of Both have in fact been tentatively attributed to the the eighteenth century. In connection with the Townesends in the past on stylistic grounds, same job John Townesend charged £ for two Cirencester by Christopher Hussey in a Country Life
Fig. . Stone hood over the door of the Principal’s lodgings at Jesus College, Oxford, carved by John Townesend, . Howard Colvin.
THE GEORGIAN GROUP JOURNAL VOLUME X THE TOWNESENDS OF OXFORD : A FIRM OF GEORGIAN MASTER - MASONS AND ITS ACCOUNTS
Fig. 3. Compton Beauchamp House, Berkshire, the north front built in ‒ under the direction of John Townesend. Howard Colvin.
Fig. . Christ Church, Oxford, the south-east return of the Peckwater Quadrangle, built in ‒ by William Townesend to the design of Dean Aldrich. Howard Colvin.
THE GEORGIAN GROUP JOURNAL VOLUME X THE TOWNESENDS OF OXFORD : A FIRM OF GEORGIAN MASTER - MASONS AND ITS ACCOUNTS article of , and Compton Beauchamp by myself influence if not actually designed by him. on the occasion of a visit by the Oxford Architectural Cirencester House was the seat of Allen, st Lord and Historical Society in the s. Bathurst, a Tory nobleman celebrated for the great Compton Beauchamp is a moated manor-house landscape park which he created to the west of his built round a small courtyard. Brickwork of Tudor house. Much less notable was the reconstruction of or Jacobean character is visible in several places, but the Jacobean mansion which he had inherited in . the entrance-front was rebuilt in stone in ‒ by Its projecting wings were demolished and the main its owner, Edward Richards. The general block was refronted in a vernacular classical style resemblance of the front to the eastern of the two end which, as Christopher Hussey pointed out, showed a elevations of the Peckwater Quadrangle, then under certain ‘resemblance to some Oxford college blocks’, construction at Christ Church, is obvious, but the particularly at Queen’s College, ‘which was about order is different, Ionic at Christ Church, Doric at then being erected … It is not inconceivable [he wrote] Compton Beauchamp (Figs. & ). Peckwater was that Lord Bathurst may have gone to Oxford for a of course built by William Townesend to the designs builder such as Townesend’. A large bundle among of Dean Aldrich. The new front of Compton the Townesend papers shows that he was quite right, Beauchamp was built by a Gloucestershire mason and that the remodelling took place under William called Nathaniel Newman under the direction of Townesend’s direction between and . William’s father John. Between March and May Hitherto it has been thought, on the strength of a John Townesend made over journeys on reference in Bathurst’s correspondence to ‘the noise business concerning Compton Beauchamp, many in of saw and hammer’, that the reconstruction of the visiting the site, others in arranging for the transport house had taken place a decade earlier. However a of timber, lead and glass. The carpenter was his mass of bills and accounts for masonry, carpentry son-in-law Jeremiah Franklin. The total cost is not and other trades, with references to ‘altering and recorded as the mason was evidently paid direct by raising the walls of the House’, ‘taking downe the the owner. Townesend’s accounts make no reference front wall att the top and making it fit to set upon’, to drawings for Compton Beauchamp. If he did not ‘clearing out Rubbish occasioned by raising the make them, were they provided by his son, or by floors of the Hall and pulling down other parts of the Aldrich himself? The owner, Edward Richards, was House, moving the old wainscot out of the hall’, etc., a gentleman commoner of Exeter College, where he makes it quite clear that it was in ‒ that the old took a B.C.L. in , and when he died in he house was reconstructed at a cost in masonry alone bequeathed to the college library ‘a choice collection of some £ , . So when, in May , Bathurst's of Greek and Latin authors.’ He may well have friend Alexander Pope wrote enthusiastically of ‘the been acquainted with Aldrich, and he would certainly Palace that is to be built, the Pavilions that are to have known the Townesends, for in he had glitter, the Colonnades that are to adorn them’, he given £ towards the cost of the new Turl Street was presumably thinking (not, as hitherto supposed) front of Exeter, which they built. His arms appear of a pavilion in the woods, but of the new house in the vault of the gateway among those of the other which Bathurst was then contemplating. The reality principal subscribers. Even if the drawing was made was much less architecturally striking than Pope’s by John or William Townesend, it could have been vision (Fig. ), and a subsequent remodelling of the submitted to Aldrich for his approval. At any rate the house by Smirke in the early nineteenth century has front of Compton Beauchamp can be added to the merely substituted a bland neoclassical simplicity for very small number of buildings erected under Aldrich’s Townesend’s tame baroque. No doubt it was the
THE GEORGIAN GROUP JOURNAL VOLUME X THE TOWNESENDS OF OXFORD : A FIRM OF GEORGIAN MASTER - MASONS AND ITS ACCOUNTS decision to remodel the old house rather than to maintenance of Oxford colleges; their contractual build an entirely new one that induced Bathurst to arrangements; and their profits as master-builders. employ an Oxford master-builder rather than an The documentary history of the Headington architect from the Burlington circle frequented by quarries on the north-eastern outskirts of Oxford Pope. He was probably unaware that in , when begins in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, with he was only , the elder Townesend had been the use of Headington stone for building at New employed to design and build some gatepiers and a College in the s and at All Souls in c. . In summerhouse at Cirencester Abbey, the seat of the , William Orchard, master of the works at Bathursts’ neighbour Thomas Master. But as a Magdalen College, undertook to provide stone for member of Trinity College, where he had matriculated building Eton College both from ‘his great quarry in , he may well have seen some of the buildings that he farmeth of the king in the parish of Headington’ in Oxford for which the Townesends had more and from his other quarry then ‘pertaining unto his recently been responsible. college’. Orchard died in and in his son These, and a few other minor jobs, are all that John sold the Magdalen quarry, having first ‘called the account-books yield in terms of newly identified all the … men working in divers men’s quarries architectural works. They confirm that in the first half together’ to inform them of the transaction. So in of the eighteenth century the Townesends’ business the early sixteenth century there were several quarries, was overwhelmingly in Oxford and its immediate and more were evidently opened as stone was neighbourhood. Most of their commissions further required for different buildings. At the beginning of afield were due to Oxford connections. The owner Elizabeth’s reign the court rolls show that nine of Compton Beauchamp, as we have seen, was a different colleges were in possession of quarries at gentleman commoner of Exeter; the rector of Headington. These would presumably have been Middleton Cheney in Northamptonshire, whose house for their own use rather than for commercial John Townesend altered in , was the Principal exploitation, but at the end of the seventeenth century, of Brasenose. The employment of the firm to carry when stone was being procured from many sources out repairs at Winchester College in ‒ and for use at St Paul’s Cathedral, the Headington must have been due to the link with New quarries provided their quota. Two firms were College, and it was the patronage of other Oxford involved, one headed by the Oxford master mason colleges that led to William altering one farmhouse in Bartholomew Peisley II (d. ), the other by John Wiltshire in ‒ and designing another one in Green. Green, a Headington mason, was in the Isle of Wight in . partnership with Robert Robinson, Peisley with But it is as the working records of a major firm of Richard Piddington and John Townesend. The late Stuart and Georgian master-builders that the Peisleys and the Piddingtons were connected by Townesend papers are uniquely valuable. They would marriage and John Townesend had been apprenticed repay analysis in strictly economic terms: wage-rates, to the elder Peisley. Later, his son William would work-forces, prices of materials, transport, and so forth. take his father’s place as the Peisleys’ partner in the This is a task for some future economic historian quarrying business. The St Paul’s accounts show working in the tradition of Knoop and Jones. that between / and / stone to the value What I propose to discuss here are aspects of the of £ , (including the cost of carriage by water Townesends’ business that are important from the down the Thames to London) was supplied by point of view of an architectural historian: their stake Peisley and partners, but that Green and Robinson in the Headington quarries; their involvement in the outdid them, supplying stone worth £ , during
THE GEORGIAN GROUP JOURNAL VOLUME X THE TOWNESENDS OF OXFORD : A FIRM OF GEORGIAN MASTER - MASONS AND ITS ACCOUNTS the same period. Thereafter, Green and Robinson delivered at All Souls College from our own pitt’ continued to supply Headington stone for several implies that the Townesends had a second pit of more years, but Peisley and Townesend dropped their own (for which no accounts are preserved). In out, probably because they needed the whole output the course of time others may have come under their of their quarry for their own purposes. control. Writing in to Dr George Clarke of All In the s the quarry, now worked by William Souls about a proposed contract with William Townesend and Bartholomew Peisley III (d. ), Townesend, Nicholas Hawksmoor reminded him that was leased from a brickmaker and lime-burner called the latter had ‘all the best quarrys of stone in his owne Henry North for £ per annum. It produced both hands’. Even so, the output of the Townesends’ ordinary freestone and the hardstone used for plinths, quarries was insufficient for their needs, especially etc., and the partners kept a joint account of the cost during the busy years of the early eighteenth century, of operating the quarry and of the amount of stone when they bought a good deal of stone from Green used by each of them. A note in of ‘ston and Robinson and others. For instance, all or most of
Fig. . Cirencester Park, Gloucestershire, as remodelled in ‒ by William Townesend; engraving by W. Angus, .
THE GEORGIAN GROUP JOURNAL VOLUME X THE TOWNESENDS OF OXFORD : A FIRM OF GEORGIAN MASTER - MASONS AND ITS ACCOUNTS the stone for the Column of Victory at Blenheim which three, Wadham, Trinity and St John’s, employed William Townesend built in ‒ was supplied by Bartholomew Peisley , with whom the Townesends Green and another quarryman called Stanley. Most shared their quarry, and with whom they were joint of the stone for the gatehouse and Turl Street front contractors for several major jobs such as the Radcliffe of Exeter College was also procured from Green and Quadrangle at University College and the Codrington Robinson. Bibury stone was used for fine carved Library at All Souls. One can therefore see the force detail in such places as the Exeter gateway vault, the of the Oxford diarist Thomas Hearne’s statement saucer dome under the cupola at Queen’s, the vaulted that ‘Peisley and one Townesend carried (as it were) ceiling of the Buttery at All Souls, and the Ionic all the business in masonry before them, both in capitals of Pembroke College Chapel. The plain Oxford and all the Parts about it’. In addition the stone chimneypieces often found in Townesend Townesends were the university masons, an buildings appear generally to have been made of employment in which William Townesend succeeded Burford or Bibury stone. one of the Robinsons in / . It was in this Although the Townesends had no monopoly capacity that William repaired or rebuilt the piers of of Headington stone, their ownership, joint or sole, the gateway to St Mary’s Church in ‒ , and of some of the best quarries, and their ability to that in ‒ John Townsend III was to rebuild in obtain more stone from other quarrymen, was vital to stone the fan-vault in the Convocation House. their business. But for the Headington quarries one Precisely which masons were employed by which can be fairly certain that there would have been no college at any given time is perhaps of less importance Townesends of Oxford. Their place might well than the fact that in the early eighteenth century, have been taken by the Strongs of Taynton or the as in the early nineteenth, the firm had a regular Kempsters of Burford, just as at Cambridge, were there university clientele to provide it with the kind of was no freestone quarry, it was not a local family, but work that filled William Townesend’s day-books: the Grumbolds from Raunds, a quarrying village in altering doorcases, cutting down windows, rebuilding Northamptonshire, who became the leading mason- chimneys, inserting chimneypieces, making ‘pissing architects in that university. places’, paving with the black and white squares David Sturdy has shown how from onwards known as ‘michells’, repairing the dial at Corpus, the backbone of the business which Thomas Knowles fixing ‘antickitys’ against the staircase of the Old took over from the last of the Townesends (Stephen, Ashmolean Museum. Anyone who is familiar with who died in ) was the maintenance of Oxford the rooms in the older Oxford colleges will know colleges. This continued to be the case until the that in the course of the late seventeenth and early s, when the firm began to lose its college eighteenth centuries the existing medieval and associations to other more enterprising firms. The Tudor accommodation, designed for sharing by poor colleges in question were All Souls, Corpus, Exeter, scholars, was largely rearranged to provide spacious Jesus, Lincoln, Magdalen and New College. From sets of two or three rooms for single occupation. the Townesends’ day books one can see that in the Much of this, of course, was employment for case of All Souls, Corpus, Exeter, Jesus and New carpenters and joiners, but the alteration of doorways College the connection went back to the early years and the removal of mullions and transoms from of the eighteenth century, and that Brasenose, Christ windows to make way for sashes was work for masons, Church and Queen’s were also regular employers as was the insertion of stone or marble chimneypieces, during the first quarter of that century. Of those sometimes with surrounds of blue and white Dutch colleges that did not employ the Townesends, at least tiles. On top of this routine work were the new
THE GEORGIAN GROUP JOURNAL VOLUME X THE TOWNESENDS OF OXFORD : A FIRM OF GEORGIAN MASTER - MASONS AND ITS ACCOUNTS
Fig. . Monument to John Townesend (d. ) in St Giles’ churchyard, Oxford. Howard Colvin.
buildings for which the Townesends were nearly partner Peisley in St Michael’s Street shows how fine always the sole or joint master-masons, as they were a dwelling an eighteenth-century Oxford master- at All Souls, Balliol, Christ Church, Corpus, Exeter, mason could aspire to, while in St Giles’ churchyard New College, Oriel, Pembroke, Queen’s, Trinity, John’s monument (Fig. ) is as eloquent in stone in University College, Worcester and the Clarendon proclaiming his status as the Latin inscription is in Building. At the Radcliffe Library they shared the words. ‘Mr. Townesend’s’ reputation as a ‘great masonry contract, not with any Oxford mason, but man’ who could not be hurried over an order for a with Francis Smith of Warwick: for by then, Peisley monument is attested by Thomas Rowney, Oxford’s having died in , there was no other major firm of MP, himself a man of considerable standing in the masons in Oxford who could be associated with them city, and the ‘vast deal of money’ that William in so great a task. made is commented on by Hearne. There is no That the profits of so extensive a business must means of estimating the Townesends’ annual income, have been substantial is obvious. Of the house that but their accounts do provide some information about John Townesend built in Broad Street in the profits of a mason’s business that is not easily (roughly on the site of Boswell’s shop) there seems to forthcoming for any other Georgian master-builder. be no visual record , but the surviving house of his Here it is necessary to outline the principal forms
THE GEORGIAN GROUP JOURNAL VOLUME X THE TOWNESENDS OF OXFORD : A FIRM OF GEORGIAN MASTER - MASONS AND ITS ACCOUNTS of engagement between an eighteenth-century the Office of the King’s Works, to such an extent that master-builder and his employer. At one end of the it had to submit to higher prices in consequence. scale was the contract ‘by the great’, whereby a This, too, might sometimes be known as ‘task-work’. master-craftsman, be he mason, carpenter or Of these three forms of engagement, work by the bricklayer, undertook to erect an entire building, great or by measure seems to have been regarded as walls, roof, floors and all, for a specified sum. the most profitable. At any rate Richard Jenings, the This might be appropriate for a moderate-sized master carpenter at St Paul’s Cathedral, who was building on a vacant site, but not for a complicated paid by the day, stated in that he had not been remodelling job where the amount of materials and ‘near so great … a Gainer … as Masters that have workmanship would be difficult to predict. If the been employed by Task Work’, but that he ‘could contractor was a mason, he would normally sub- never obtain the Privilege of working by Task, or by contract the carpentry and joinery, if a carpenter, he the Great’, though he had ‘very often desired it of Sir would sub-contract the masonry, and so forth. Chr. Wren’, and Wren confirmed that, although Alternatively the owner could contract separately Jenings had often pressed him to be employed ‘by with a representative of each trade, employing an Measure, Valuation or Task-work’, he had always architect, if there was one, or one of the contractors, insisted that he should work ‘by the Day, as finding it if there was not, to oversee the work of the others and to be a much cheaper and better way for the Church thus avoid confusion on the site. Smaller contracts, than the other’. sometimes made by word of mouth rather than in Deprived of the no doubt substantial margin of writing, were known as ‘task-work’, and were often profit which contracting by the great or taskwork used for specialist jobs such as ornamental ironwork offered, Jenings made a hidden profit by claiming to or plasterwork which was outside the competence of have paid his workmen at a higher rate than was in the principal contractors. fact the case, and being reimbursed accordingly. At the opposite extreme was the owner who had Nominally he paid them s. d. a day, actually s. or stone and timber at his disposal and who employed less. As there were a hundred or more of them, the masons, carpenters and other craftsmen by the day difference amounted to a considerable sum. When to work under the direction of an architect, clerk of challenged, Jenings claimed that what he had done works or master-builder, whose role was that of an was normal practice, that ‘masters and undertakers in agent. The latter would keep a nominal roll of other trades as well as mine have an advantage by workmen, with the record of their pay, and reclaim their men’, and that his employees received the full this from the owner. For his trouble he might be paid rate that he had agreed with them, even if it was less either a percentage or a round sum at the conclusion than the St Paul’s Commissioners had been led to of the work. suppose. Ninety of them signed an affidavit to this In between was the contract for prices, otherwise effect, and Wren certified that Jenings’ work had known as work ‘by measure’, whereby the owner been of a high standard. Nevertheless in he was undertook to pay the workmen at specified rates: so dismissed from the cathedral works. He had, after much per foot for masonry of different sorts, so much all, defrauded the Commissioners, even if he had per ‘square’ ( feet) for flooring and so forth. For paid his workmen what they expected. the owner this had the advantage of being payment by Jenings’ claim is borne out by other evidence, results, for the builder of requiring less capital than particularly Campbell’s book The London Tradesman the contract ‘by the great’, though employers might of , where he writes of joiners who commonly sometimes be dilatory in payment, as notoriously was pay their workmen s. d. per day but charge their
THE GEORGIAN GROUP JOURNAL VOLUME X THE TOWNESENDS OF OXFORD : A FIRM OF GEORGIAN MASTER - MASONS AND ITS ACCOUNTS customers s. But there was one eminent Georgian four instalments, the last in July . His own master-builder who did not take any ‘advantage from accounts show that he subcontracted the carpentry his workmen’ in this way: that was Francis Smith of to his brother-in-law Jeremiah Franklin, who Warwick, whose reputation for honesty and fair received £ s. for his workmanship. Other sub- dealing is well attested. He rarely if ever contracted contractors were a smith called Fossett (£ s. d.) ‘by the great’, but preferred to operate on a ‘cost plus’ and ‘Mr. Taylor’, evidently the Oxford plumber and basis, providing his client with a detailed estimate of glazier John Taylor (£ s. d.). Townesend’s the cost of workmanship and materials and charging total recorded outlay, including stone charged to the a per cent commission on the actual outlay. ‘One Headington quarry account, was £ s. d., leaving shilling in the pound’ was, he told Sir Justinian him with a balance of £ s. d. This would Isham, ‘my usuall Pay from other Gentlemen’, and at represent a profit of over per cent, well above the Ditchley he asked ‘five pounds for every Hundred I per cent that was stated to be the standard rate of have paid, & for my own trouble, Journeys, profits builders’ profit at the end of the eighteenth century. out of my workmen, & measuring the work’. At Christ Church Peckwater Quadrangle was Did the Townesends follow Smith’s example of built in three stages, first the north side ( ‒ ), probity in his business dealings, or did they make a then the west side ( ‒ ), and finally the east side hidden profit like Jenings? The survival (in part) both (‒ ). For all three sides Townesend was the of their own accounts and those of their collegiate master mason and George Smith the master carpenter. employers may provide a unique opportunity to The north side was built by direct labour under their answer this question. At one time or another they joint direction, the west and east sides by separate undertook work on all the differing terms outlined contracts for the masonry and carpentry, respectively. above. Thus William Townesend entered into at For the west side, with its bigger return elevation, least five contracts to build ‘by the great’: for the Townesend received £ , , for the east side £ , . Radcliffe Quadrangle at University College in Only for part of the north side do any of Townesend’s (jointly with Peisley), for the Robinson Building at own accounts survive, none for his performance of Oriel in , for the hall at All Souls in , and for the two masonry contracts. two sections of Queen’s College, one in , the Other contracts, like those for Blenheim Palace, other in . For the University College, All Souls the Fellows’ Building at Corpus ( ), the and Queen’s contacts, worth £ , , £ , , £ Codrington Library at All Souls ( ), Christ Church and £ , respectively , his own accounts are Library ( ), Radley House ( ) and the Radcliffe lacking, but for the Oriel building we have both the Library ( ), being for prices, do not enable any original contract, preserved in the college archives, calculation of profits to be made. When, as at and Townesend’s record of his expenditure in Compton Beauchamp, the function of the master performance of it. In William Robinson, workman was supervisory only, there may have been Bishop of London, offered to pay for a new building a small element of profit in John Townesend’s charges at Oriel, and on February Townesend for journeys, and he no doubt received some payment undertook to build it ‘by the great’ for £ . It was to at the end as a fee or gratuity. In a London master - stand on the east side of Garden Quadrangle, and carpenter undertaking to supervise the building of a was designed in a traditional Oxford style to conform house in Somerset, besides himself contracting for to the rest of the college, that is to say with mullioned the carpenter’s, mason’s, bricklayer’s and plasterer’s windows and shaped gables. It was to be completed work at prices specified in the contract, was to be by February . Townesend was duly paid £ in paid £ for supervising the building as a whole.
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We do not know the terms of William Townesend’s So much for the nature of the Townesend’s engagement to supervise the reconstruction of profits as master-builders. Although no estimate of Cirencester House for Lord Bathurst in ‒ , but, their income is possible from the evidence available, besides being himself responsible for the mason’s it is easy to credit Hearne’s statement, made in , work, which was paid for by measure, he directed that William Townesend’s extensive employment in the other workmen and passed their bills for payment the university ‘had procur’d [him] a vast sum of by the owner. Apart from whatever profit he may Money’. Some of this was invested in property in have made on the masonry, he will have expected Oxford, which included a public house in St Aldate’s some remuneration for his supervisory role and this called ‘the Anchor and Wheatsheaf’; some was used may be represented by a payment of £ to ‘Mr. to set up a profitable sideline in malt; and some was Townesend’ recorded in Bathurst’s account at let out at interest. How they spent the rest we do Hoare’s Bank on January . not know, for none of the surviving account-books is Finally there was the day-work option favoured by of a personal character. Wren at St Paul’s and sometimes by Oxford bursars, When William Townesend died in his son for instance at Exeter College in . There is one John took over his contract for the masonry of the day-work job where the Townesend’s private accounts Radcliffe Library. Some accounts in the family papers and those of their employers coincide sufficiently relate to this job, but, as already mentioned, they do closely to determine whether there was any sharp not appear to add anything significant to the accounts practice on the part of the forme r. This was at preserved in the archives of the Radcliffe Trustees. Queen’s College in , when William Townesend The completion of the Library in marks the end undertook to build part of the main quadrangle on a of the early eighteenth-century building boom in day-work basis. We have both his own record of the Oxford. Although building went on throughout the wages paid weekly to his men and the statement that second half of the century, there was less work for he submitted to the Provost. The two are identical masons than there had been earlier, and for such of it except that in the Provost’s copy there has been a as there was the Townesends found themselves mark-up (see Appendix). In every week the total has increasingly in competition with other builders. been increased, apparently on an arbitrary basis, so Still, John Townesend’s successor, another John that, for instance, £ s. d. in the first week of June (probably, as Sturdy has suggested, a son of William’s becomes £ s. d., whereas £ s. d. in the third London-based brother John), continued to find work week becomes £ s. d. Over the whole year in Oxford and its neighbourhood, although none of (January to December ) the increment comes to his accounts have been preserved to document it. He £ s. d. on a total of £ s. d. So Jenings’ had two major contracts for bridges over the claim that masters in other trades took a hidden Thames, at Maidenhead and Henley, but lost heavily profit in the same way as himself is borne out by the over the former, and failed in to win the Townesends’ accounts. What they did at Queen’s contract for Magdalen Bridge, which went to a man they no doubt did elsewhere when undertaking called John Randall, who underbid him by a work to be paid for by the day. Why otherwise substantial margin. He died in , leaving the would Hearne record (in ) that the elder business to his son Stephen. In Stephen sold it Townesend was known as ‘Old Pincher, from his to his foreman Thomas Knowles, in the hands of pinching of the workmen’? whose successors it still flourishes today.
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APPENDIX William Townesend’s accounts for wages paid to workmen at The Queen’s College,
Townesend’s Account submitted Townesend’s Account submitted private account to Provost private account to Provost £ s. d. £ s. d. £ s. d. £ s. d. [ ] Jan. Sep. Jan. Sept. Jan. Sept. Jan. Sept. Feb. Oct. Feb. Oct. Feb. Oct. Feb. Oct. March Oct. March Nov. March Nov. March Nov. April Nov. April Dec. April April Wages paid since the Account May given in to the Provost: May £ May May Townesend family papers May Queen’s College archives June June June June July July July (overtime) (overtime) July Aug. Aug. Aug. Aug. Aug.
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NOTES W.G. Hiscock, ‘William Townesend, mason and Building accounts in Oxford, Exeter College archives, architect of Oxford’, Architectural Review , XCVIII, C II ( ). Oct , ‒ . H. Avray Tipping had already David Green, Blenheim Palace , London, , . introduced the Townesends in a well-informed paper Sturdy, op.cit. , about Hawksmoor published in the Journal of the Entered in index under letter S. Royal Institute of British Architects , XXXIV, Sept. Wren Society , XIX, . For the Strongs, see my , ‒ , and in the Vanbrugh volume of his Biographical Dictionary of British Architects ‒ , English Homes , London, , . Hiscock New Haven and London, , ‒ . incorporated a version of his article in his Christ Hiscock, op.cit. , ‒ . Church Miscellany , Oxford, , ‒ . The New College summerhouse (in the Warden’s David Sturdy, A History of Knowles & Son , British garden) was correctly attributed to Townesend on Archaeological Reports, British series , Oxford, stylistic grounds by Gervase Jackson-Stops, in John . Buxton and Penry Williams (eds.), New College Oxford Now in the Bodleian Library, Oxford (hereafter ‒ , Oxford, , . The attribution to Bodleian), and the British Library, London, Townesend of the doorcase to the Library ( ibid .) is respectively. also confirmed by one of Townesend’s day books Robert Willis & John Willis Clark, Architectural [‒ , f. v, entry dated /]. History of the University of Cambridge , Cambridge, John Townesend’s Day Book ‒ , f. . It was , III, ‒ . made of Bibury stone. A pocket-book of Charles Cope Trubshaw for the John Townesend’s pocket book (dated on cover). years ‒ is in the National Library of Wales, MS. In another book is an account for work at Blenheim, B, and some drawings were in the collection of dated , which includes an item of £ ‘for the late Mr Astell Hohler. Some ledgers, pocket-books, pargeting funells at s. each’. etc of Christopher Kempster (d. ), the Burford In fact only two, both by the elder Townesend, the master-mason, are preserved in the Public Record other (besides the plans of Queen’s mentioned here) Office, C / , and St Paul’s Cathedral Library [see being for garden buildings at Cirencester Abbey, for W.D. Caroe, Wren and Tom Tower , Oxford, , which see below, n. . ‒ ]. The letter-book of the master-mason Andrews Cf. Victoria County History (hereafter VCH ), Jelfe (d. ) in the British Library, Add.MS , Oxfordshire, III, , . should also be mentioned. Mr Charles Powell is about Christopher Morris (ed.), The Journeys of Celia to publish in Construction History a study of a small Fiennes , London, , . firm of Devonshire builders called Prawle whose Illustrated in Country Life , XLIV, Nov. , accounts and day books survive from onwards. ‒ , with text by H. Avray Tipping. I am much A polite letter from Webb among the Townesend indebted to the present owners, Mr and Mrs Eric papers refers to a ‘very cursory inspection’, in the course Penson, for kindly allowing me to study and of which he ‘did not discover a lot of information’. photograph their house. I am very grateful to their present owner, who wishes Probably the Nathaniel Newman buried in Windrush to remain anonymous, for allowing me to study them. churchyard under a very fine baroque tomb similar in For access to college archives I have to thank Prof Ian character to John Townesend’s in St. Giles churchyard, Maclean and Dr Norma Potter at All Souls, Mrs Judith Oxford. He died on December , ‘in advanced Curthoys at Christ Church, Dr John Maddicott at Age’ [R. Bigland, Gloucestershire Collections , Exeter, Dr Jeremy Catto at Oriel, and Prof John Kaye Gloucestershire Record Series, VIII, , ]. The and Mr Jonathan Bengtson at The Queen’s College. front of Compton Beauchamp may well be built of S.G. Gillam (ed.), The Building Accounts of the Windrush stone. Radcliffe Camera , Oxford Historical Society, NS, See entries in his Day book for ‒ , ff. , XIII, . ‒ , . Oxford, Oxford City Council, Archives, L. .., C.W. Boase, An Alphabetical Register of the Hannisters’ Book ‒ , p. , April . Commoners of Exeter College, Oxford , Oxford, ,
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; ibid. , Register of … Exeter College, Oxford , Sturdy, op.cit. , ‒ . Oxford Historical Society, XXVII, , . London, Guildhall Library, MSS. , / - ; Wren Oxford, Exeter College Archives, C II ( ), list of Society , XV, , etc.. In addition John Townesend benefactors to the New Building, . sent stone worth £ to the works at Hampton Court Christopher Hussey, ‘Cirencester House, in [Account-book ‒ marked ‘V’]. Gloucestershire – I’, Country Life , CVII, June , Marbled book marked ‘Quarry’, ‒ . In John , . Townesend’s day-book North is referred to as ‘Mr James Lees-Milne, Earls of Creation , London, , . North the Lime man’, and there are payments to him George Sherburn (ed.), The Correspondence of for bricks and lime. Alexander Pope , Oxford, , II, . Marbled quarry-books, ‒ and ‒ . Nicholas Kinglsey, The Country Houses of Quarry-book, ‒ , p. . Gloucestershire , II, ‒ , Chichester, , . Bodleian, MS. All Souls c. , b, no. . John Townesend’s Day Book ‒ , f. v, where Account for building the Column in Townesend’s his ‘draughts’ for Mr Master’s ‘somer hous & papers. greenhous’ and for ‘pears for the garding and a dore Oxford, Exeter College archives, C II ( ); see also ceas’ are itemised, as well as ‘ draughts of his hous’. Christ Church and Exeter account book in Joseph Foster, Alumni Oxonienses , Oxford, , I, . Townesend’s papers marked ‘ ’ on cover. E.g. extensive alterations by John Townesend to a Idem , C II ( ); for Queen’s cupola, see account in house in Broad Street, Oxford (on the site of Exeter’s Bodleian, MS. Rawlinson D, , f. ; for All Souls north front) for William Wright, Recorder of Oxford, Buttery, VCH. , Oxfordshire , III, ; for Pembroke in , and a chimney built at Adderbury House for Chapel, note by Edmund Esdaile in Pembroke College the Duke of Argyll in ‒ [for Adderbury, see Record , /, ‒ . Later, Bibury stone was specified Richard Hewlings, ‘Adderbury House’, in Malcolm by James Wyatt for the Ionic capitals of Oriel College Airs (ed.), Baroque and Palladian : The Early Library, built to his designs in ‒ by Edward Eighteenth Century Great House , Oxford, , Edge, mason of Oxford [W.J. Arkell, Oxford Stone , ‒ ]. At Shotover William Townesend built the London , ]. octagonal temple designed by William Kent, whose Sturdy, op.cit. , , , , . date is established by his accounts as ‒ , but The joint quarry account shows that in ‒ there is no reference to the building of the Gothic Bartholomew Peisley signed for small quantities of temple there, which probably took place at a date not stone for use at St John’s, Trinity and Wadham. From covered by any of the surviving account-books [for the summer of Peisley was also using a good deal Shotover, see James Lees-Milne, English Country of stone at Worcester College, where he, rather than Houses: Baroque ‒ , London, , ‒ ]. Townesend, was evidently the original mason- Dr John Meare, Rector of Middleton Cheney, contractor, the latter taking over after Peisley’s death in ‒ [Foster, op.cit. , III, , ]. [cf. VCH. , Oxfordshire , III, ]. At Trinity Peisley J.H. Harvey, ‘Winchester College’, Journal of the British covenanted in to maintain the marble pavement Archaeological Association , rd ser., XXVIII, , . which he was to lay in the chapel, and in he built Hiscock, op.cit. , ; VCH , Wiltshire , IX, . the gateway at the end of the garden [Oxford, Trinity Douglas Knoop & G. P. Jones, The London Mason in College archives, Misc. vol. , ff. , ]. the Seventeenth Century , Manchester, and other Colvin, Biographical Dictionary , cit. , works. H.E. Salter (ed.), Remarks and Collections of Thomas Buxton & Williams, op.cit. , ; Howard Colvin & Hearne , Oxford Historical Society, LXV, , . J.S.G. Simmons, All Souls. An Oxford College and its Bodleian, Oxford University Archives, Vice- Buildings , Oxford, , . Chancellor’s Accounts, /. Willis & Clark, op.cit. , I, . Ibid. , and William Townesend’s ‒ day book, J. H. Harvey, English Mediaeval Architects. A f. v. Biographical Dictionary to , Gloucester, , . I.G. Philip, in Bodleian Library Record , VI, , ‒ . Bodleian, MS. Rolls Oxon. (Headington Court L.S. Sutherland and L.G. Mitchell (eds.), History of Roll for Elizabeth). For a map of the quarries see the University of Oxford , V, The Eighteenth Century , W.J. Arkell., Oxford Stone , London, , . Oxford, , ‒ .
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Gillam, op.cit. , xv-xvi and passim. quarry account as for use at Oriel cost £ s. d., but An account-book marked ‘V’ ( ‒ ) shows that there are payments on the main account for stone the total cost was £ s. d., of which the acquisition amounting to £ s. d and further unspecified of the site accounted for £ . payments amounting to £ s. d. to John Bostall, Refronted by Peisley c. with a façade in the style of who appears to have been the man in charge of the Vanbrugh, and now known as ‘Vanbrugh House’ jointly-owned quarry. Except for the payment to ‘Mr [Colvin, Biographical Dictionary , cit ., ]. Fossett for smith’s work & materials’ all the other items According to the Latin inscription he was in are for unspecified services or materials. Townesend architectonica magister peritissimus exactis demum himself drew up no balance of receipt pluribus et ad scientiam et ad universitatis hujusce and expenditure. ornamentum aedificiis (‘a most skilfull master of Fourth Commission of Military Inquiry (Parliamentary architecture who had carried out many buildings both Papers, ), Appendix, , . The Oriel contract for the advancement of knowledge and the adornment was, however, regarded as a good bargain for the college of this university’). by Dr George Clarke, who in recalled ‘Every body Bodleian, MS. Top Oxon. b. , f. , letter dated remembers the dearness of Sir N. Lloyd’s buildings [at Feb. /. All Souls], and how much cheaper the Bishop of F.M. (ed.), Remarks and Collections of Thomas Hearne , London built, at Oriel’ [Bodleian, MS. All Souls Oxford Historical Society, XLVIII, , . c. , no. ]. H.M. Colvin (ed.), History of the King’s Works , V, Oxford, Christ Church archives, Chapter Acts London, , 45-6. ‒ , Oct , xxxiii, b. ‒ : Peckwater Thus John Townesend described his agreement in building accounts, III, nos. , . to perform the masonry of part of the Inner For Blenheim see David Green, op.cit. : for Corpus, Quadrangle at Jesus College at the rate of s. per perch Bodleian, MS. Rawl. Letters , f. ; for the as ‘taskwork’ in his Day Book, f. . Codrington Library, All Souls archives, Acta in Wren Society , XVI, . Capitulis ‒ , f. (a schedule of prices); for Ibid. , ‒ . He was also accused of embezzling Christ Church Library, Jean Cook & John Mason materials. (eds.), The Building Accounts of Christ Church Jeremy Boulton, ‘Wage Labour in seventeenth century Library , Roxburghe Club, ; for Radley House, London’, Economic History Review , XLIX( ), . see Reading, Berkshire Record Office, D/EP. L. /; Colvin, Biographical Dictionary , cit. , . for the Radcliffe Library, n. above. Bodleian, MS. dd.Radcl. c. (Radcliffe Trustees’ Taunton, Somerset Record Office, DD/SF : account-book ‒ ); Bodleian, MS. All Souls c. , contract between Edward Clarke and William Taylor b, no. ; Queen’s College archives ZW and of London, carpenter, to build Chipley House, Bodleian, MS. Rawlinson D. , f. for the Somerset; cf. Bridget Clarke, ‘William Taylor: new contract; ibid. , f. for a report on Townesend’s Discoveries’, Georgian Group Journal , VIII, , ‒ . performance of the contract. London, Hoare’s Bank, Ledger , p. . I owe this Oxford, Oriel College archives, ; Townesend reference to Prof. Andor Gomme. papers, book with marbled cover marked ‘Queen’s’ Oxford, Exeter College archives, C II ( ). and ‘Oriel’. Townesend papers, book with marbled covers marked Malcolm Graham (ed.), Oxford City Apprentices ‘ ’; Queen’s college archives, account book ‒ . ‒ , Oxford Historical Society, NS, XXXI, F.M., loc.cit .. , , no. . Ibid. , . Townesend’s account is in two parts. One is headed Bought in and mentioned in Townesend’s will ‘The Account of Time in building at Oriel College’ [P.R.O., PCC HENCHMAN] and records wages paid weekly and totalling £ s. Account-book in parchment cover marked ‘ ’. d. The other is headed ‘moneys paid at Oriall College This is largely devoted to the purchase of barley and for Materialls & Cariage /’ and totals £ s. the sale of malt, but also includes details of the wages d. The largest item is £ s. in three instalments to paid to masons employed at Blenheim in . ‘My Brother Franklin on Account of Carpenters Day book ‒ , at end. The rate charged was Work’. Stone separately charged to the Headington per cent.
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Particularly James Pears, the master-carpenter who was employed by James Wyatt for several of the buildings designed by him in Oxford [see Geoffrey Tyack, “The Making of the Radcliffe Observatory”, in this volume]. Others were William Osborn, the mason who built the Canterbury Quadrangle at Christ Church, ‒ , and Edward Edge, the mason for Oriel Library, ‒ [Sutherland and Mitchell, op.cit. , ‒ ]. Sturdy, op.cit. , . T.W.M. Jaine, ‘The Building of Magdalen Bridge’, Oxoniensia , XXXVI, . Sturdy, op.cit. , .
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