2l8 THE CttURCti BELLS OF DORSEf. 



list of his peals fell into my hands. Dublin, the Island of 

 S. Vincent, and Carnarvonshire know him ; and, above all, 

 Liverpool, where his grand twelve, tenor 4-icwt., hang, in 

 S. Nicholas tower. 



In Dorset his chief work was at Poole, for which he cast the 

 eight in 1821. In 1827 he cast five out of the six for 

 Sturminster Newton, and there are single bells of his at Corfe 

 Castle and East Stoke. He died in London in 1842, aged 62, a 

 brother of the Charterhouse, where he is buried. 



The Whitechapel foundry (removed from Phelps's old site to 

 the Artichoke] enters Dorset in 1750, when Thomas Lester made 

 the Langton Matravers treble. Afterwards he took Thomas 

 Pack into partnership, and died early in 1769, his nephew, 

 William Chapman (whose granddaughter, an old lady, named 

 Skinner, was kind to me at Cambridge), joining Pack as 

 junior partner. Their bells are at Portland S. George and 

 Moreton. In 1781 Pack died. Mrs. Skinner told me that a few 

 years before this time her grandfather was engaged in some 

 work for a parish in Kent, and noticed the intelligent interest 

 taken by a young man from the place. This led to the young 

 man, whose name was William Mears, entering the foundry as a 

 worker, and, after doing a little business on his own account, 

 becoming Chapman's partner. Chapman died of consumption 

 in 1784, and the whole business rested on William Mears, who 

 brought his brother Thomas, a brewer at Canterbury, to help 

 him. The only Dorset work by Chapman and Mears is the bell 

 at Arne, cast in 1782.* Thomas Mears in 1789 took the 

 foundry by himself, and in 1804 co-opted his son Thomas, 

 whose name we find alone from 1809 to 1844. Thomas II. 

 was succeeded by his sons Charles and George. Soon after 

 the death of the former Robert Stainbank became partner to the 

 latter. 



The Whitechapel bells are too many to recapitulate 

 altogether about 120 some by Mr. Lawson, who died 



* The eight at Wareham are by William Mears, 1785. 





