Details of Sculptor

Surname

Adron family

Alternative Surname

First Name

Initial of Surname

A

Year of Birth/Baptism

Flourished

Year of Death

Biographical Details

William Adron I -1809
Samuel Adron
William Adron II 1780-1867
Charles Adron c1787-1865
Masons of the name of Adron are known to have been active in London from 1748. By the turn of the 19th century the firm was based in the New Road, where it was still recorded in 1836. Identified monuments of the firm date from c1793. Gunnis considered their best work to be the monument by William Adron II to Henry Bewes, which has a relief of a woman mourning by a pillar carrying a portrait-medallion of the deceased (1). On the whole, Gunnis regarded the monuments as ‘uninspired, though the details of the tablets are carefully carved’ (Gunnis 1968, 15). One of the last known works of the firm was the temple in the Greek style to the memory of Dr Richard Valpy, headmaster of Reading School (8).
A William Adron, ‘mason’, was listed in the Westminster Poll-Book for 1748 in King Street, Golden Square. In 1809 the will was published of William Adron I, a mason living in the New Road, near Fitzroy Square, St Pancras. He may be the King Street mason. In his will, which was proved on 23 September 1809, he left sums amounting to about £100 to his brothers, sisters and nephews and the residue of his estate to his brother Samuel Adron. He appears to have been the uncle of William Adron II and Charles Adron.
Samuel Adron was the residual legatee of his brother William I’s estate. There is an undated payment to a mason called Samuel Adron for a chimneypiece supplied to Shugborough Hall (13).
William Adron II was born on 20 September 1780 and christened at St Marylebone church, the son of Samuel Adron and Elizabeth, née Wheeler. His parents had married the previous year. He is recorded, along with Charles Adro,n at Quickset Row, Tottenham Court Road, in 1822 (Pigot 1822, 153). In 1825-26 William II and his brother Charles were clearly running the firm, for their names appear on bills paid by John Nash for decorative ornaments at Buckingham Palace (15). They charged £6 14s 9d for 24 1/2 days’ masonry work, which included dismantling the marble chimneypiece in the state apartments. The firm must have encountered difficulties soon after this as the brothers were declared bankrupt in 1830 (London Gazette, 24 December 1830, inf: Jon Bayliss). William II is buried with his brother Charles in Kensal Green Cemetery. Works produced by the firm after 1809 are listed under William’s name and works produced after 1825 are assumed to be joint productions of William and his brother Charles.
MGS
Literary References: Gunnis 1968, 14-15; Robinson 1989, 37; Curl 2001, 197-8, 213n
Archival References: TNA WORK 5/125 fol 332, fols 340-70; Longleat HA, 1800-1818 (accounts from ‘Messrs Adron-statuary’); IGI
Will: William Adron I, PROB 11/1502/420