Details of Sculptor

Surname

Gayfere

Alternative Surname

First Name

Thomas III

Initial of Surname

G

Year of Birth/Baptism

1755

Flourished

Year of Death

1827

Biographical Details

He was born on 9 January 1755 in Church Street, Millbank, the son of Thomas Gayfere II. He exhibited drawings at the Society of Artists in 1774 and 1777 and at the Royal Academy in 1778, 1779 and 1780. Gayfere married Ann, daughter of Evan Jones, of Oakham, Rutland.
On 7 December 1802 he succeeded to the position of Master-Mason to Westminster Abbey, a post he initially held jointly with his father. Gayfere superintended the repairs to Henry VII’s chapel, 1809-22, an exercise he performed with scrupulous attention to detail. He visited quarries in St Albans, Woburn and Bath before finding the appropriate stone at Coombe Down, Somerset, and took measurements and casts of all the surviving ornaments of the chapel before making full working drawings. His carvers included Maitland and David Boag, John Teasdale I and John Teasdale II. Brayley felt that ‘the spirit and correctness,’ with which the decoration was executed showed ‘skill, judgment, and ingenuity’. Furthermore it was ‘no eulogium to say that the execution of this task could not have been entrusted to a more capable artizan than Mr Gayfere’ (Neale and Brayley 1818-23, 23).
Gayfere’s work initially aroused controversy but he was quick to deflect criticism. In 1810 the Gentleman’s Magazine indignantly reported that he proposed ‘to knock up a sky light’ in the ceiling of Henry VII’s chapel, an act which would have mutilated and disfigured the building (GM 1810, 539). Gayfere responded by attempting to take John Carter, the architectural writer and source of the article, to law. Gayfere himself signed a letter to the magazine from his home in Abingdon Street in 1811 with a sworn statement that the allegation was untrue.
In 1814, two years after his father’s death Gayfere undertook repairs to the great rose window. He also signs the monument in the Abbey to Mrs Vincent (1). In 1819-22 he restored the north front of Westminster Hall with Bath stone under the direction of JW Hiort of the Office of Works. In 1810 he was employed at Somerset House (PRO, AO 1/2499). Gayfere retired as mason to the Abbey in 1823.
He died in Burton-on-Trent on 20 October 1827 and was buried at Newton Solney, Derbys. His tombstone reads: ‘His qualities as a man will find their best memorial in the affection of his survivors; while the restoration of Henry VII’s Chapel and the Hall at Westminster will prove a lasting monument of his abilities as an architect.’ A street in Westminster was named after him in recognition of his work for the Abbey. His obituary in the Monthly Magazine declared that ‘the faithfulness of his workmanship will be a lasting testimony to his abilities and it is by no means too great praise to aver that to no other individual could the interests of that edifice [Westminster Abbey] have been better entrusted. At its completion the antiquary rejoiced and the fears which had been long entertained gave way to feelings of gratification’ (Monthly Mag 1828, 224).
MGS
Literary References: GM 1811, 341; Chester 1876, 483; Toynbee 1927, l57; Gunnis 1968, 165; Colvin 1995, 395
Archival References: GPC
Auction Catalogues: Gayfere’s Library, BL SCS 138/7