INDUSTRIES 



and having read Du Halde, he discovered both 

 the petunze and kaolin. It is this latter earth 

 which he says is essential to the success of the 

 manufacture. He is gone for a cargo of it, having 

 bought from the Indians the whole country where 

 it rises. They can import it for 13 per ton, 

 and by that means afford their china as cheap as 

 common stoneware. 



Another patent was applied for by Frye on 

 17 November 1748, and the specification was 

 enrolled 1 7 March 1 749. This was for the 

 manufacture of ' porcelain ware ' from totally 

 different materials, and the wording of this 

 patent was even more obscure than that of 

 the first. The substance for which protec- 

 tion was claimed was a ' virgin earth ' pro- 

 duced by calcining animals, vegetables, and 

 fossils, ' but some in greater quantity than 

 others, as all animal substances, all fossils of 

 the calcareous kind, as chalk, limestone, &c.' s 



Thomas Frye was born near Dublin in 

 1710, and in early life came to London, 

 where he followed the profession of an artist. 

 He painted for the Saddlers' Company the 

 full-length portrait of Frederick Prince of 

 Wales preserved in their hall, which he also 

 engraved and published in 1741. He be- 

 came manager of the Bow works probably 

 from their commencement, but after fifteen 

 years' exposure to the furnaces his health gave 

 way and he retired in 1759. After staying 

 for a year in Wales, he returned to London 

 and resumed his occupation as an engraver, 

 publishing a series of life-size portraits in 

 mezzotint, by which he is best known to the 

 world at large. Frye died of consumption on 

 2 April 1762, and is described in his epitaph 

 as 'the inventor and first manufacturer of 

 porcelain in England.' His two daughters 

 assisted him in painting the china at Bow 

 until their marriage. One of them, who 

 married a Mr. Willcox, was employed by 

 Josiah Wedgwood at Etruria in painting 

 figure-subjects from 1759 to 1776, the year 

 of her death. Heylin and Frye do not appear 

 to have had a factory of their own, but prob- 

 ably carried on their experiments at a factory 

 already existing at Bow, having first secured 

 the services of a well-skilled workman whose 

 name has not been preserved, and who may 

 have been the real inventor of English porce- 

 lain. Of Heylin nothing is known except 

 that he was a merchant at Bow, and his name 

 disappears from the second patent, taken out 

 in 1749. In the following year Frye no 

 longer appears as a principal, but as a manager 

 to another firm. Some valuable information 

 concerning the Bow factory is given in a col- 



' Chaffers, op. cit. 888. 



lection of memoranda, diaries, and notebooks, 

 formerly belonging to Lady Charlotte 

 Schreiber, 6 which includes a diary of John 

 Bowcocke, who was employed in the works as 

 a commercial manager and traveller. These 

 state that Messrs. Crowther and Weatherby 

 were proprietors of the Bow manufactory, and 

 that Thomas Frye acted as their works 

 manager. Their works were known as ' New 

 Canton,' and though situated on the Essex 

 side of the River Lea, close to Bow Bridge, 

 were commonly described as the Bow China 

 Works and were so styled by the proprietors. 

 About 1758 the firm reached its highest point 

 of success. The memoranda above mentioned 

 state that in that year three hundred person 

 were employed, ninety of whom were painters, 

 all living under one roof. An account of the 

 business returns for a period of five years 

 shows that the cash receipts, which were 

 6,573 ' n I 75~ I > increased steadily from 

 year to year, and had reached ^11,229 in 

 1755. The total amount of sales in 1754 

 realized ^18,115. The firm had a retail 

 shop in Cornhill and a warehouse at St. 

 Katharine's near the Tower. 7 Among the 

 artists whom they employed were some of 

 considerable repute. J. T. Smith records the 

 following conversation between Nollekens the 

 sculptor and a dealer in works of art named 

 Panton Betew, from whom he wished to 

 obtain a model of a boy by Fiamingo by way 

 of exchange : 8 



Nollekens. Do you still buy broken silver ? I 

 have some odd sleeve-buttons, and Mrs. Nollekens 

 wants to get rid of a chased watch-case by old 

 Moser, one that he made when he used to model 

 for the Bow manufactory. 



Betew, Ay, I know there were many very clever 

 things produced there ; what very curious heads 

 for canes they made at that manufactory ! I 

 think Crowther was the proprietor's name. There 

 were some clever men who modelled for the Bow 

 concern, and they produced several spirited figures: 

 Quin in Falstaff; Garrick in Richard ; Frederick, 

 Duke of Cumberland, striding triumphantly over 

 the Pretender, who is begging quarter of him ; 

 John Wilkes, and so forth. 



Nollekens. Mr. Moser, who was the keeper of 

 our Academy, modelled several things for them ; 

 he was a chaser originally. 



George Michael Moser, who died in 1783, 

 was the head of his profession as a gold-chaser, 



* Extensive extracts from these MSS. are given 

 in Chaffers, Marks and Monograms (1900), 894 

 et seq. 



7 They appear in Kent's Dir. from 1753 to 1763 

 as Weatherby and Crowther, potters, St. Katha- 

 rine's, near the Tower. 



8 Nollekens and bis Times (1894), 175-6. 



