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James Wild, Egypt, and St John's Church, Hampstead: A Postscript to Christ Church, Streatham

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 April 2016

Neil Jackson
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Extract

In my earlier essay on ‘Christ Church Streatham and the Rise of Constructional Polychromy’, I noted that ‘sometime between May and September 1842 [James] Wild departed for Cairo, together with Joseph Bonomi, as part of Richard Lepsius's expedition. There he remained over five years ….’ These dates I concluded from receipts paid to him for work at Streatham and now held in the London Metropolitan Archives and from information contained in Mark Crinson's book Empire Building, Ornamentalism and Victorian Architecture.

Since writing this, Professor Michael Port has kindly brought to my attention documents which he discovered in the Hampstead Parish Church Archives which throw some further light on Wild's movements. It would seem that his time in Egypt was not as lengthy or as continuous as I had thought.

In February 1842 the Revd Thomas Ainger, vicar of St John's Church, Hampstead, had promoted an architectural competition for the enlargement of the church to provide additional accommodation for the poor of what was a rapidly increasing parish. In March, entries were received from Robert Hesketh, William Lovell, W. J. Donthorne and Louis Vulliamy, but the winning design came from James Wild. This would have suited Wild well, for his work at Streatham was now pretty well finished, the church having been consecrated the previous November.

Type
Research Article
Information
Architectural History , Volume 45 , 2002 , pp. 483 - 484
Copyright
Copyright © Society of Architectural Historians of Great Britain 2002

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References

Notes

1 Jackson, Neil, ‘Christ Church Streatham and the Rise of Constructional Polychromy’, Architectural History (2000), p. 240.Google Scholar

2 Ibid., n. 145.

3 Crinson, Mark, Empire Building, Ornamentalism and Victorian Architecture (London and New York, 1996).Google Scholar See my article, n. 86.

4 See Port, M. H., Hampstead Parish Church. The Story of a Building Through 250 Years (Hampstead, 1995), p. 19.Google Scholar

5 Ibid.

6 Revd Thomas Ainger to Mr T. Toller, 27 October 1847. Hampstead Parish Church Archives. (Professor Port believes Toller to be the clerk to the Church Trustees, or to the Vestry, or both.)

7 James Wild, writing from his brother's house at 25 Mortimer Street, to Revd Thomas Ainger, 29 July 1846, Hampstead Parish Church Archives.

8 St Mark's Church, Alexandria, , was published and illustrated in The Builder, 5 September 1846, pp. 421,426.Google Scholar

9 James Wild to Revd Thomas Ainger, 1 August 1846, Hampstead Parish Church Archives.

10 Trustees Minute Book, 11 January 1848, Hampstead Parish Church Archives.