Details of Sculptor

Surname

Watson

Alternative Surname

First Name

White

Initial of Surname

W

Year of Birth/Baptism

1760

Flourished

Year of Death

1835

Biographical Details

White Watson was a sculptor, marble-worker, geologist and mineral-dealer who lived in Bakewell, Derbys throughout most of his life. He was born at Whiteley Wood Hall, near Sheffield, on 10 April 1760, the son of Samuel Watson II and the nephew of Henry Watson. During his boyhood White paid frequent visits to his uncle’s marble mill and shop, and from an early age took an interest in the collections of fossils and minerals which his uncle sold from time to time. He kept his uncle supplied by visiting local quarries and mines and soon started his own collection. He left Sheffield School at the age of 14 and on 31 May 1774 went to live with his uncle who had retired to Bakewell in 1773. For some years White helped carry on his uncle’s business and in 1782 he advertised himself as a sculptor and engraver. When Henry Watson died in 1786 the marble mill was sold, but White continued to trade as a dealer and finisher of marble products. He sold these, together with articles in blue john and alabaster, in his museum-shop at the Bath House in Bakewell. A trade card of 1825 states that he, ‘executes monuments, tombs, &c. / Gives Lessons on Geology and Minerology; / And Furnishes Collections./ AFFORDS INFORMATION TO ANTIQUARIANS; / And Amusement to Botanists’ (repr Tomlinson 1996, 48).
Gunnis notes that Watson signs a number of tablets, mostly in Derbyshire, and that his ‘most important monumental work is the semi-Corinthian column, 15 feet high, with a central inscription-tablet in the form of a parchment, which commemorates Sir Sitwell Sitwell’ (18). Watson’s account book, which is in private ownership, records payments for further monuments, chimneypieces, ornaments in Derbyshire spar, collections of fossils and other items. Among those who puchased collections of fossils from him between 1796 and 1802 were Alexander Hume, the Duke of Rutland, Sir Joseph Banks, Mr Wedgwood, the Marquess of Blandford and Viscount Charville. He was paid £66 18s 9d for ‘designing the grotto and for fossils’ for Chatsworth in 1798 and in the same year received £21 for ‘Lectures on minerology given to the three young ladies and the Marquess of Hartington’ (Watson Accounts in GPC). Watson is probably best known for his unusual inlaid marble specimen panels using polychrome rocks from Derbyshire and adjoining counties. He produced nearly 100 of these geological ‘tablets’, which were supplied with explanatory pamphlets. Purchasers included Sir Thomas Woollaston, the Earl of Newburgh, the Duke of Leeds and Berriah Botfield, who bought two for £34 (ibid). Examples survive at Chatsworth House, Derby Museum, the Oxford University Museum of Natural History and elsewhere (see Ford 1995, 164 for a full list).
In addition to these activities, Watson published a number of geological books including catalogues of his collections and A Delineation of a Section of the Strata in Derbyshire (1811). He kept records of the weather, and made botanical and horticultural observations which earned him a fellowship of the Linnean Society in 1795. He was noted locally for his ability to record human profiles, either in ink or as marble inlays, and he occasionally wrote poetry. He was an assiduous collector and preserver of family records and it is thanks to his efforts that so many of the drawings and papers of his uncle and grandfather, Samuel Watson I, have been preserved. He died on 8 August 1835 and was buried in Bakewell churchyard.
MGS
Literary References: Ford 1960, 349-363; Gunnis 1968, 416; Ford 1995, 157-164; Tomlinson 1996, 25, 32, 48-9, 84-90; Brighton 1998, passim; Brighton 2001, 55, 56-9
Portraits of the Sculptor: Tradecard with portrait silhouette (repr Tomlinson 1996, 48)