815 



WYATT, MATTHEW DIGBY. 



WYATT, SIR THOMAS. 



846 



ascertain tho views of manufacturers and others with respect to a 

 great national exhibition ; and on that errand they visited and can- 

 vassed the principal seats of manufacture in the kingdom, holding 

 public meetings in many, and gathering good assurances of support. 

 The results of their work they carried to Balmoral, and received 

 authority to commence the enterprise. In the arduous labours which 

 preceded 'the appointment of the Royal Commission Mr. Wyatt took 

 an active part, and when that issued he was formally confirmed in the 

 office of secretary to the executive committee, in which capacity he 

 continued to act until the building committee demanded his exclusive 

 attention. His professional knowledge was found eminently useful to 

 the commissioners, and he was employed to superintend the works, 

 make all the necessary contracts, regulate accounts, &c. Work amount- 

 ing in cost to upwards of 50,000. was directed by him as architect, 

 under the supervision of Sir William Cubitt. On the completion of the 

 undertaking Mr. Wyatt had the honour of receiving from Prince 

 Albert his private gold medal, with a letter commending his services 

 from tho beginning; he also received a bonus of 1000L in addition to 

 his salary from the Royal Commissioners. For the Catalogue of the 

 Exhibition Mr. Wyatt wrote a popular account of the construction of 

 the building, and for the Institute of Civil Engineers (of which he is 

 an Associate) a more elaborate account, for which he was rewarded 

 with their Telford medal. In 1850 he formed the acquaintance of 

 Mr. Brunei, who entrusted him with the duty of co-operating with 

 him in designing the new station of the Great Western Railway at 

 Paddington, the waiting-room for her majesty at Windsor, and various 

 other works. 



On the opening of the Great Exhibition Mr. Wyatt undertook, at 

 the request of Messrs. Day and Son, an important work upon its con- 

 tents. This work ' The Industrial Arts of the xixth century,' in 2 

 vols. folio, with 160 plates in chroinolithography, involved no mean 

 amount of labour. While carrying it on however, he found time to 

 bring to a close another work, the preparation of which had been com- 

 menced many years previously, and for which, while abroad, he had 

 made many drawings and extensive collections : ' Metal Work and its 

 Artistic designs,' in 1 vol. folio, with 50 coloured plates. He also 

 designed a memorial window in stained glass, erected to the memory 

 of William Huskisson by his widow in the summer of 1852. About 

 the same time he became actively interested in the Crystal Palace 

 Company. With Sir Joseph Paxton and Mr. Owen Jones he went 

 into the several questions connected with the designs, arrangement, 

 &c., of the present structure, as well as the objects by which it should 

 be made interesting and instructive. In August 1852 he started on a 

 tour with Mr. Owen Jones to collect works of art from the principal 

 museums, &c., of Europ?, and backed by a credit of 20,OOOZ. and 

 Foreign Office credentials, met with unexpected success. On his 

 return, after four months' incessant labour, he started through England 

 to collect casts of mediteval sculpture, &c. With Mr. Jones he then 

 set to work on the Fine Art Courts and arrangements of the Crystal 

 Palace, which were sufficiently completed for the opening to take 

 place on the 3rd of June 1854. The principal works falling exclu- 

 sively under Mr. Wyatt's control were the Queen's Screen, the 

 Pompeian House, the Court of Christian Monuments, and the Byzan- 

 tine, Mediaeval, Renaissance, and Italian Courts. To the latter four 

 he prepared, in co-operation with Mr. J. B. Waring, a series of hand- 

 books. For Messrs. Day and Son he also produced a work in 4to, 

 ' The Crystal Palace and Park.' 



In the same year he received her Majesty's commands to design a 

 memorial to the late Mr. Neeld, and to restore the chancel of North 

 Marston Church, Bucks. In 1855 he took charge of the department of 

 English stained glass at the Paris Universal Exhibition for the Board 

 of Trade ; and was employed by the East India Company to design 

 and superintend the arrangements of their display. On the opening 

 of the Exposition he was appointed (in conjunction with the Duke of 

 Hamilton) juror for class 24 (furniture and decoration). The duties 

 of the office having been discharged, he was desired to report upon 

 the department by the English government. The report, which was a 

 somewhat detailed one, was subsequently published by the Board of 

 Trade. At the close of the Exhibition Mr. Wyatt was nominated a 

 chevalier of the Legion of Honour for " services rendered to industry 

 and the arts." In the latter part of the year, with his brother Mr. 

 Thomas Henry Wyatt, he competed for the premiums offered to all 

 the world by the War Department for the best designs for barracks, 

 and was fortunate enough to obtain the first premium for cavalry. 

 About the same time he wrote an historical ' Essay on Ivory carving,' 

 which was published with photographic illustrations by the Arundel 

 Society, for whom he also got up an exhibition, and delivered a lectui'e 

 at the Crystal Palace (subsequently published) on the works of Giotto 

 at Padua, &c. For these services he was elected an honorary member 

 of the society. 



Shortly after his return from Paris, Mr. Wyatt was applied to by 

 the East India Company to co-operate with their regularly appointed 

 architect in preparing designs for additional accommodation to be pro- 

 vided for their museum at the India House; and on the sudden 

 demise of that gentleman in 1856 Mr. Wyatt was appointed to the 

 office he had held. For the Company, since that date, he has executed 

 in this country many works of considerable importance, including in 

 addition to the above, barracks for about 400 men ; a military hospital 



for 100; extensive drainage works, a church, a large drill shed, &c., 

 and several elaborate surveys. For India he has co-operated with 

 the late Mr. Ilendel in the design of several great bridges, viz. the 

 Saone, Koul, and the Hullohur, while for the East India Company he 

 has designed an iron church with 900 sittings for Rangoon, and a 

 general post-office and electric telegraph station of large extent for 

 Calcutta, 



In the summer of 1856 Mr. Wyatt was invited to become honorary 

 secretary to the Royal Institute of British Architects, to which he 

 had at different times made various communications, and of which, as 

 well as of the Royal Society of Antiquaries, he was a Fellow. In 

 the autumn of 1856 he wrote two essays on 'Renaissance' and on 

 ' Italian Ornament,' for Mr. Owen Jones's magnificent work, ' The 

 Grammar - of Ornament.' He is now preparing a contribution on 

 ' Metallic Art ' for Mr. Waring's important publication on the Manches- 

 ter Exhibition. Mr. Wyatt was an exhibitor of drawings in water- 

 colours at the Universal Exhibitions both of London and Paris, gaining 

 at the former a prize medal with commendation for "good taste in 

 designs generally,' and at the latter a first class medal We have 

 given a bald statement of Mr. Wyatt's many important labours : but 

 they speak so amply for themselves that any commendation of them 

 would be not merely superfluous but misplaced. 



WYATT, RICHARD J., an eminent sculptor, was born in Oxford- 

 street, London, on the 3rd of May 1795. Having chosen sculpture as 

 his profession, he was placed as a pupil with Charles Rossi, R.A. ; and 

 about the same time he entered the Royal Academy as a student. 

 During the seven years which he served with Rossi, he twice carried 

 off medals at the Royal Academy. He afterwards worked for a short 

 time in the atelier of Bosio at Paris, and he completed his professional 

 education under Canova, whose acquaintance he had formed in 

 London, and who kindly invited him to Rome, and offered him his 

 advice and assistance in the prosecution of his studies. In the atelier 

 of Canova, he had Gibson for a fellow-student, and the friendship here 

 formed between the young students, who were ultimately to rank 

 together as the first English sculptors in Rome, remained unbroken 

 through life. With Canova Wyatt likewise retained the warmest 

 friendship, till the death of the great Italian master. Wyatt went to 

 Rome in 1821, and he made that city his permanent abode, only once 

 making a brief visit to his native country in 1841. He died suddenly 

 at Rome on the 29th of May 1850. 



Wyatt was a man of singularly gentle unassuming temper, and quiet 

 retiring habits. His whole life was spent in the diligent prosecution 

 of his profession at which he laboured often from dawn till near 

 midnight. The number of his works is very great, and they are of a 

 very unusual order of merit. He was greatest in poetic and classic 

 subjects, in which he displayed a fertility and grace of invention, a 

 singular elegance of thought, and a degree of finish beyond most of his 

 contemporaries. He was undoubtedly one of the purest and most 

 refined of our poetic sculptors. His figures, and especially his female 

 figures, are beautifully modelled, always posed with grace and anima- 

 tion, and always present pleasing forms from whatever side they are 

 viewed. His draperies too are invariably well cast, and he expresses 

 textures truly, yet without breach of sculpturesque propriety. As 

 examples of his style may be mentioned his statues of ' A Nymph 

 entei-ing the Bath' one of the most beautiful of his many versions of 

 which, was that executed for Lord Charles Townshend; 'Nymph 

 leaving the Bath ;' ' Shepherdess with a Kid ; ' ' Shepherd 13oy ; ' 

 'Glycera; 'Musidore;' 'Bacchus;' and 'Penelope,' an exquisite 

 statue executed for her Majesty ; and his admirable groups of the 

 ' Nymph Eucharis and Cupid ; ' ' Ino and Bacchus ; ' ' Nymph of Diana 

 taking a thorn from a greyhound's foot; 'and 'A Huntress with a 

 Leveret and Greyhound' his last work. He also produced many 

 excellent portrait busts, some relievi, and monumental sculpture. At 

 the Great Exhibition of 1851, several of his works were exhibited, 

 and the medal for sculpture was awarded to him, though dead. Mr. 

 Wyatt was not a member of the Royal Academy, a bye law of that 

 institution rendering artists ineligible unless resident in England. 

 Casts from several of Wyatt's works including most of those named 

 above are in the Crystal Palace at Sydenham. 



WYATT, SIR THOMAS, called ' the Elder,' to distinguish him 

 from his son, the subject of the next article, was born at Allington 

 Castle in Kent, in the year 1503. His father, Sir Henry Wyatt, the 

 representative of a family of some consequence, originally from York- 

 shire, appears to have bettered his worldly fortune by attaching him- 

 self to the rising fortunes of Richmond, afterwards Henry VII. He was 

 imprisoned in the Tower, in the last years of Richard III., and treated 

 with great severity. Immediately after the battle of Bosworth, he was 

 liberated, and must have been early placed by Henry in situations of 

 emolument, for in 1493 he was able to purchase the castle of Allington. 

 He was one of the executors of Henry's will, and appears to have 

 enjoyed as much favour from the son as from the father. He obtained 

 a grant of part of the estates of Empson, the first that were forfeited 

 to the crown in the reign of Henry VIII. He survived till 1538. 



Nothing is known of the tenor of Thomas Wyatt's life previous to 

 his being entered of St. John's College, Cambridge, in 1515, when ho 

 was twelve years old. He took his bachelor's degree in 1518, and pro- 

 ceeded to his Master's degree in 1520. The next incident in his life, 

 the knowledge of which has been preserved, is his participation in a 



