Henry Godwin, born 1811. Died June 19, 1874.

Author of The Worthies of Newbury (1859); and The English Archaeologists’ Handbook (1867). The latter was described in the Proceedings of the Society of Antiquaries as “the first attempt of its kind, and like all first attempts less complete than one could wish...” [2nd series, vol. 6, 1873-6 p. 353]

He was born at Bath, and settled in Newbury in 1837. He became a prominent Newbury solicitor, and was Clerk to the Magistrates.

He was involved in the Newbury Literary & Scientific Institution (founded in 1843 in Speenhamland, which moved to Bartholomew Street before moving again c.1862 to new premises in Northbrook Street). Adnams’s Newbury Almanack and Directory, for 1849 lists him as a vice-president of the Institution, by then in Bartholomew Street. He was involved in the “restoration” of St Nicolas’ Church.

In 1847 the Post Office Directory of Berkshire lists him with a Market Place address (p. 2003); the Post Office Directory of Berkshire for 1864 lists “Godwin & Son, solicitors, Northbrook street” (p. 632).

Macaulay’s Berkshire Directory of 1855 lists him as clerk to the Newbury Borough Magistrates (and listed again as part of Gray and Godwin, Northbrook Street); Secretary to the Newtown Road cemetery (with G. Povey as the keeper); and one of seven vice-presidents of what is there described as the “Literary and Mechanics’ Institution” (in Bartholomew Street).

He became a Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries (FSA) on February 18, 1841. He was involved in the Congress of the British Archaeological Association held at Newbury in 1859 (see the Journal of the British Archaeological Association vol. xvi, 1860). He was a founder member of the Newbury District Field Club, and edited the first volume of its Transactions (1870-71).

He died on June 19, 1874 at his home The Lawn, Speen Hill [now 24 Old Bath Road]. Full obituary in the Transactions of Newbury District Field Club vol. 2 1872-5; and a brief obituary in the Proceedings of the Society of Antiquaries (which gives date of death as June 22).

Works
The Worthies of Newbury (full title, The Worthies and Celebrities Connected with Newbury, Berks and its Neighbourhood), J. Blacket, Newbury, 1859
The English Archaeologists’ Handbook, James Parker, Oxford, 1867.

Articles:
Archaeologia
vol. xliv 1873 pp. 459-479 “On Donnington Castle, Berkshire” (Paper read Feb 13, 1873)

Journal of the British Archaeological Association
vol. xvi (1860) pp. 232-234 “The Worthies and Celebrities connected with Newbury and its Neighbourhood.”
vol. xxviii pp. 313-327 “Notes on the West Saxon bishoprics, more particularly that of Sherborne”

Transactions of Newbury District Field Club
vol. i.
“Historical Notes on Kingsclere and Freemantle park”
vol. ii
“Shaw House and note on the Second Battle of Newbury” pp. 7-11
“Donnington Castle, Berks” pp. 23-48
“A brief sketch of the early history of Welford” pp. 80-87
“Ufton Court” pp. 107-110

Proceedings of the Society of Antiquaries
2nd series vol. iv. p. 125. “J. Y. Akerman, Esq. F.S.A. communicated an account when he had recently received in a letter from H. B. Goodwin [sic] Esq. of a discovery of Roman remains on the estate of the Earl of Carnarvon, at Burghclere, Hants...” [Extracts from the letter are then quoted]
2nd series vol. v. p. 137.

Bibliography
Adnams’s Newbury Almanack and Directory, for 1849

British Library catalogue
Macaulays BerkshireDirectory 1855, Reading 1855

Post Office Directory of Derbyshire, Leicestershire...Berkshire...etc 1847, London p. 2003.
Post Office Directory of Northamptonshire, Huntingdonshire... Berkshire and Oxfordshire, ed. E. R. Kelly, London, Kelly and Co. 1864 Private pp. 630-631 and Commercial p. 632.
Proceedings of the Society of Antiquaries 2nd series, vol. 6 1873-6 (obituary 1875 p. 353).
Transactions of Newbury District Field Club vol. 2 1872-5 (obituary pp. xvii-xix).

Author: David Peacock
© FNRC

HENRY GODWIN

At the death of Henry Godwin on June 19th 1874, at his residence The Lawn on Speen Hill, Newbury lost an eminent and valuable citizen.

Mr. Godwin was born in 1811 in Bath, though his antecedents were of Wiltshire stock. He began practising as a solicitor in 1833 in Southampton, but in 1837 he moved to and settled in Newbury, having offices in the Market Place and later Northbrook Street. His worth was recognised when he was appointed Clerk to the Magistrates. Though by profession a solicitor, Mr Godwin's private interests were literary and historical and as early as 1841 he became a Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries. Early in his career he wrote a three volume historical novel entitled "Stonehenge, or the Romans in Britain." Also two volumes of poetry, which his contemporaries did not judge to be of high value, but were interesting; one contained hymns and the second recorded some religious thoughts, including some which had been translated from Greek and German. In fact Mr. Godwin was fluent in several languages and as well as the ones previously stated, he read Spanish and French.  Other works from his hand were the second volume of Transactions of the Newbury Field Club containing works on Donnington Castle and the History of Welford. His "The Worthies of Newbury" was read to the British Archaeological Association when it met at Newbury in 1859.

His interest in history and Newbury involved in his becoming a founder member the Newbury Field Club and a Vice President of the Literary Institution for many years. The parish church benefited greatly from his interest when it need of extensive restoration. In particular the east window received his financial interest.

Mr Godwin was a great supporter of the plans to create a cemetery to relieve the overused church graveyards, which were causing health hazards in the centre of town. A site on Newtown road was identified and decided upon. Mr Godwin was a keen supporter of the two chapels — one for members of the Church of England and the other for Non-conformists. He died in 1874 after a seven month illness and he was buried in the cemetery in a grave opposite the door of the Church of England chapel. His family proposed and financed the stained glass window there in his memory.

He married Martha (maiden name probably Burke) of Bray around 1835 before coming to Newbury. A family soon began to arrive; Henry Burke Godwin in 1836, Laura Adele in 1838, John Charles in 1840, Charlotte Ellen in 1842 and Caroline Elizabeth in 1846.

Besides Mr Godwin being buried in the cemetery, his wife joined him in the family vault in 1905, where his daughter Laura Adele had been buried in 1868 and his son John Charles in 1898.

Author: Julie Goddard
© FNRC

Newtown Road Cemetery   -  The Anglican Chapel Window

Henry Godwin was born in Bath in 1811 and came to Newbury in 1837.  He was a fellow of the Society of Antiquaries.  His books include ‘Worthies and Celebrities connected with Newbury and Neighbourhood’ and ‘The English Archaeologists Handbook’.  He was co-founder of the Newbury District Field Club and was central to the setting up Newbury Cemetery Company in 1847.

The window was commissioned by Martha Godwin as a memorial to her husband Henry Godwin and installed just 8 months after his death in 1874.  She apparently broke tradition as Henry had been closely involved with the society for installing stained glass windows in St. Nicholas Church which had invariably chosen windows by the Birmingham based company Hardman.

The Newbury Weekly News 25^th March 1875 reported:  Memorial window.  The painted window, which is a memorial to the late Henry Godwin Esq, has been placed in the Lower Cemetery Chapel.  The subject is The Resurrection which has been treated with great beauty and effect.  Messers Heaton Butler and Bayne were the artists employed.

This was a fortuitous choice as not only is the window rather more striking than those in St Nicholas church but at the time there was some experimentation with high borax glass fluxes resulting in painted glass that soon lost its detail.  Hardman’s studio was notorious for this problem.  Heaton had researched glass paints and developed his own ‘indestructible colours’ such that they had at their disposal a palette of more than 130 different colours.  These included a variety of new soft and gentle colours so that at this time Victorian glass was no longer a nostalgic imitation of the middle ages when only about 10 colours were available.

With the Anglo-Catholic renaissance during the reign of Queen Victoria the artistic use of stained glass was revived and the number of Studios increased dramatically.

Heaton Butler and Bayne (HBB) was founded by Clement Heaton (1824-82) and James Butler (1830 – 1913) in 1855.  They were joined by Robert Turnhill Bayne (1837-1915) in 1862 and in the same year they won first prize at an international exhibition in Kensington.  Their work was also displayed at the Paris International Exhibition in 1867 and at Philadelphia where they won a prize in 1876.  Many thousands of windows can be attributed to them and in their Victorian heyday they employed large numbers of craftsmen at their extensive studios in King Street Covent Garden.

The window is unusual for 1874 and seems unlike any other extant for the period.  There is no documentary evidence detailing the designer of the window and it is likely that the window was in part ‘assembled’ from established designs by a number of artists which were repeated.  Possibly this is true for the two top right figures and the face of Christ.  By 1874 Bayne was no longer producing window designs but it is very likely that the Roman soldier faces are by his hand.  There is a strong similarity to known work by him.         

In addition, the detail which has gone into the folds and design of the         Work by Bayne at Denton, Norfolk white/yellow robes (See Photo)  seems attributable to his hand. 

In 1862 HBB achieved something of a coup when they poached from Clayton and Bell (a well-known stained glass manufacturer) such a  ‘designer of genius’ as Bayne.  He became a partner in HBB specialising in the design of work for ecclesiastical authorities.  He was trained by Clayton and his early influences were stained glass windows of the 14^th century as well as the early watercolours painted by Dante Gabriel Rossetti.  Initially the work of Bayne was influenced by the gothic revival style but strong influences came from William Morris, Edward Burne-Jones and Ford Maddox Brown and the Pre- Raphaelite movement  (PRB) generally. 

Robert Turnhill Bayne  (see Photo)

Between 1864 and 1878 HBB commissioned Henry Holliday who was within the PRB circle to design a number of windows for them and all these influences can be clearly seen in the later work of Bayne particularly with regard to figures and the use of colour. 

According to Martin Harrison

 ‘Bayne took Claytons already excellent figure design a stage closer to pre- Raphaelitism and became one of the finest artists involved in High Victorian stained glass’

Sources

Newbury Weekly News.

Correspondence with Robert Bayne.

The Condition Report on the Stained Glass Newtown Cemetery Chapel by Paul San Casciani Stained Glass Consultants for Newbury Corporation.

English Heritage - notes on HBB

HBB: Un Siecle d’Art du Vitrail

David Clow  FONRC   April 2014

Author: David Clow
©

Henry Burke Godwin was Henry Godwin’s son.

He committed suicide in 1895 after he had lost £20,000 in a project of Samuel Elliot's to purify smoke when the project failed. 

It was an idea way-ahead of its time. £20,000 is conservatively reckoned to be worth 2 million pounds by today's standards, depending on which yardstick you use to determine the value (others suggest it could be as much as 20  million!).

Fog or Smog was ever present in victorian towns.  In many ways this unhealthy atmosphere was considered normal and in addition coated buildings with soot, and caused serious health hazards for many.

In this situation, to purify the smoke before releasing it into the air would seem a wise and lucrative course of action and a local Newbury businessman, SAMUEL ELLIOTT, having watched his son playing with a chemistry set, came up with a scheme to do just that, patented in Britain in 1889. 

Full details are contained in his application for a U.S. Patent which can be viewed on-line  (briefer details are in the Journal of Electrical Engineering of 1890 and The Bay of Plenty Times, 16th February, 1891), but, basically, the idea was to force smoke through water in a state of agitation to purify it before releasing it to the outside world, at the same time creating some useful by-products.  A system called “scrubbing” and ironically much in use today.

Despite exhibiting his system to the press in 1890, to MPs on the Thames Embankment in 1891, at The Mint in Birmingham in 1894 (and no doubt elsewhere), it failed to take off and Mr. Elliott was declared bankrupt in 1895 – the very year of HBG's disappearance.

The idea failed because there was no legislation to force its uptake.  HBG also had not spread his risks and had put “all his eggs in one basket.”

Henry Burke Godwin was a Newbury solicitor. Besides his partnership in Messrs Godwin & Louch, he was:-

* The Town Clerk for 18 years 

* Clerk of the Borough and County Justices

* Clerk of the Board of Municipal Trustees and Grammar School

* Secretary of the Newtown Road Cemetery Company, just like his father before him.

He lived at No. 5 Donnington Square– a prestigious location to the north of the town - together with his wife and two children, Walter and Maud. 

His father, HENRY GODWIN F.S.A., had been a solicitor too, and a well-known personage in town.  He had been instrumental in setting up the Newtown Road Cemetery Company; had been party to the establishment of the Newbury District Field Club; was the author of The Worthies of Newbury (1859), and The English Archaeologists’ Handbook (1867). And much more (further details may be found on our website). When he died in 1874, the stained-glass window in the cemetery chapel was erected and dedicated to his memory.

The first indication to the public of the breaking story of the Town Clerk's departure was in the editorial column of the Newbury Weekly News of 28th February, 1895 which observed “The town has been deeply moved during the past few days by the announcement of the sudden and mysterious disappearance of Mr. Henry Burke Godwin.”   The article continues with the following information ...

It appears he'd been present at the corporation's monthly meeting the previous week, had transacted his usual business, attended his office on Wednesday morning then left to travel to London “by no means an unusual journey”. This was 20th February.

But he didn't return that night although nothing untoward was felt until Thursday afternoon when a letter was received at his office “stating he could never again return to Newbury, there being too a mysterious allusion to Leicester being far enough for his purpose. He also returned his watch, rings and one or two personal articles.”

Godwin's partner, F.Q. Louch, his son Walter, and a member of staff set off at once for Leicester, arriving there at three a.m. on the Friday where they made enquiries at all the hotels and involved the local police. But to no avail.

The known facts are:-

On Wednesday 20th February he left his office around 11am and caught the midday train to London (Paddington).

On Thursday 21st: Letter received (London postmark) in Newbury stating he would “never return” and an allusion that Leicester was “far enough away for my purpose”.

HBG was sighted in the booking hall of Leicester Midland Station at 2:30 by William Canning who communicated this to Newbury.

HBG again sighted, this time in the Union Inn at about 6:15 where he took refreshment.

Friday 22nd: Parcel of personal items and newspaper cutting received in Newbury.

Monday 25th: A dead body was taken from the canal (no apparent connection) and HBG was recognised as one who went to see the body.

On Thursday 28th: HBG's body was found.

Friday 29th: Inquest held.  Doctor thought death had occurred “three or four days previously”.

Monday 4th March: HBG's body collected and returned to Newbury, and buried the same afternoon in Speen churchyard.

It remains a mystery as to why Henry went to Leicester but possibly there was more to his meeting with Richard Canning who he “happened to bump into” at Leicester railway station.   Possibly he was seeking further finance and was turned down.

Author: Clow/ Sylvester
©