Details of Sculptor

Surname

Dunn

Alternative Surname

First Name

Thomas

Initial of Surname

D

Year of Birth/Baptism

c1676

Flourished

Year of Death

1746

Biographical Details

Dunn was apprenticed to David Farmer of Southwark in 1690 and became free of the Masons’ Company on 12 July 1698. He was the mason for Clapham Church in 1710. As a mason-contractor he was much employed by Nicholas Hawksmoor, for whom he built Christ Church, Spitalfields, 17l4-1729, receiving payments totalling nearly £22,500, and St Mary Woolnoth, 1716-1727, which brought him nearly £12,000, including sums for carved work (6, 7). He was assisted at both churches by his partner, Thomas Bray. He also built the minister’s house at Spitalfields and Stratford-le-Bow.
In 1720 he was appointed mason to the Grocers’ Company and in 1722 he became renter-warden of the Masons’ Company. In 1729 he was paid £37 by Mr and Mrs Hays for building a wall and balustrade for a house at Wimbledon (Surrey RO K172/4/3 a-d). The iron railings and gate alone cost £65. In 1729 also, he built the church at Stratford-le-Bow. Dunn was responsible for a considerable amount of work at Greenwich Palace, where he and his partner, John Townesend II, built the south, north, north-east, north-west and east pavilions of Queen Anne’s Court between 1729 and 1731 (TNA AD 68/708710, ADM 68/708-10). In January 1732, Dunn and Townesend entered into a contract with the directors of the Bank of England to complete the building of the bank in Threadneedle Street by Michaelmas 1733.
Gunnis considered Dunn a statuary of considerable importance. His monument to Edward Peck has a portrait-bust, a baldacchino and two mourning boys (1). The work was cleaned in 1797 by John Flaxman RA, who erected the nearby monument to Sir Robert Ladbrooke. Another notable work is the monument to Edward Colman (2), which has a life-sized reclining figure in an elaborate architectural setting, with a gloria crowning the scene. Gunnis called it a dramatic and important work.
In 1739 Dunn became one of the mason-contractors for the London Mansion House. He tendered for the contract in partnership with John Deval I on 16 May 1738, competing with another group of masons comprising John Townesend of London, Christopher Horsnaile II and Robert Taylor I. Both teams quoted a figure of £18,000. Second, sealed proposals were requested, and Dunn’s partnership came up with a price of £16,975, compared with the rival consortium’s £17,200. After much delay a compromise was reached: all five were chosen by the Court of Common Council on 24 July 1739 to execute the work at a price not exceeding £17,200. Further work by the team followed in the dancing gallery in 1741-2 (£325), and in 1744 they were paid £134 for obelisks, plinths and paving at the front of the Mansion House. Dunn, like Deval and Horsnaile, was a freemason.
At the time of the Mansion House contract Dunn was based in Blackman Street, in the parish of St George the Martyr. By the time he died he owned a network of properties and land around these premises, known as Swan Yard. He had houses in Robin Hood’s Court, Little Lamb Alley, Griffin Alley, Mint Street and Horsemonger Lane and a stone yard on the north side of Kent Street. Dunn owned buildings also at Lambeth Marsh and in Princes Street, Rotherhithe.
He died on 30 April 1746 and was buried close to his late wife at St George the Martyr, Southwark. In his will, proved 2 May 1746, he divided the bulk of his estate between his sons, Edward and Charles Dunn and his daughter Sarah, who was married to Towneshend Wottonhall, a merchant resident in Portugal. A codicil offered Charles Dunn the stock in trade of the family business, an option he appears to have accepted, for the business continued under Charles for several more years. Dunn also left £5 to Richard Spangen, an executor, and sums to purchase mourning rings to George Dance, the architect, Christopher Horsnaile II and William Atkinson.
MGS
Literary References: GM 1746, 272; Malcolm 1803-7, 2, 455; Gunnis 1968, 134; Jeffery 1993, 49-50, 67, 300
Archival References: Masons’ Co, Freemen , fol 12; Court Book,1677-94, fol 126v; Court Book, 1722-51 (14 June 1722); Grocers WA, 1720-21,12; ChW Accts, Clapham parish church; Grocers’ Company archives, 1720; Accounts for building the New Churches, Lambeth Palace Library, MSS/2690-2750/2703 p32a; 2705 fols 69v, 79; 2706, fols 43, 98, 336; 2714, fols 21v-22; 2716 fols 186, 220; 2728 fol 118r-v; GPC
Will: PROB 11/747/12-15