Allan G. Wyon Explained

Allan Gairdner Wyon FRBS RMS (1882 – 26 February 1962) was a British die-engraver and sculptor and, in later life, vicar in Newlyn, Cornwall.

Many of his works are memorials with a number located in British cathedrals.^[1] Other, more decorative, works include the relief of a male figure representing the East Wind on the London Underground headquarters building at 55 Broadway above St James's Park Underground Station.^[1]

Biography

Wyon was born in 1882, the son of Allan Wyon FSA (1843–1907) and Harriet Gairdner. Wyon's father, two of his uncles, his grandfather and his great-grandfather successively held the position of Chief Engraver of Seals to the monarch.^[2] William Wyon (1795-1851) was official chief engraver at the Royal Mint.

Wyon attended Highgate School and, like others in his family, studied sculpture in London from 1905 to 1909 at the Royal Academy.^[3] From 1910 to 1911 he was an assistant sculptor to Hamo Thornycroft.^[2] Between 1924 and 1930 he was Honorary Secretary of the Art Workers Guild. He was a Fellow of the Royal Society of British Sculptors and also worked as a die-engraver, but took Holy Orders in 1933. From 1936 until his retirement in 1955, he was vicar of St. Peter's, Newlyn.^[1]

He married Eileen May Trench in 1910; they had one daughter.^[1] He had three sisters, Olive, and two others. One an Anglican Deaconess and the other a Congregational minister. His brother was Guy Alfred Wyon, a pathologist.^[2]

Works

Wyon exhibited a wide range of sculptures, busts medals and engravings at the Royal Academy. He designed commemorative and memorial medals for the Masons, the London Chamber of Commerce, and Lloyd's.^[1]

Sculptured memorials in Salisbury Cathedral by Wyon include those to:^[1]

• Bishop Ridgeway
• Bishop Donaldson
• Lieutenant General Sir George Harper
• Hon. Edward Tennant
• Bishop Ken

Other memorials include those to:^[1]

• Bishop Percival, in Hereford Cathedral.
• Bishop Frere, in Truro Cathedral.
• Bishop Walpole, in St. Mary's Cathedral in Edinburgh.
• The combined Memorial to William Pitt, 1st Earl of Chatham, and William Pitt the Younger, at Hayes near Bromley in Kent.
• Cambrian Railways War Memorial, Oswestry, Shropshire.^[4]
• The figure of St Michael, Shropshire War memorial, Shrewsbury.^[5]
• Female standing figure with laurel wreath, Hinckley and District War Memorial.
• The Richard Corfield Memorial, at Marlborough College.
• Joseph Watson, 1st Baron Manton, in Leeds Infirmary, Great George Street Entrance Hall, unveiled 1931.^[6]
• Allan G. Wyon's brother Guy Alfred Wyon (1883–1924), in Old Leeds School of Medicine in Thoresby Place, Leeds.^[7]

Other works:

• The Sorrows of Mankind, 1920
• Egyptian Nude, 1917
• Madonna and Child, Newlyn Church Cornwall
• Christ the leader, In the South Transept of St Columb Major Church, Cornwall
• New Birth, 1931, West wall of the baptistery of St Columb Major Church, Cornwall
• Lion on Rock, 1920
• Seal^[8] for the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine
• on 55 Broadway, headquarters of the Underground Electric Railways Company of London (now London Underground)
• Bronze Plaques of Kenrick and Jefferson previously at Kenrick and Jefferson Printing Works Ltd http://blackcountryhistory.org/collections/getrecord/GB146_BS-KJ/ https://www.blackcountryhistory.org/collections/getrecord/GB146_BS-KJ/ now privately owned

Notes and References

1. News: 27 February 1962. Obituaries – The Rev. Allan Wyon. The Times. 55326. 15. 4 June 2009.
2. Wyon family (per. c. 1760–1962), die-engravers and medallists . 4 June 2009 . Attwood . Philip. 2004 . 10.1093/ref:odnb/64499 .
3. Wyon, Allan Gairdner, L. Forrer, Biographical Dictionary of Medallists; Vol. VI, London, 1916, pp. 580-581.
4. Book: Francis, Peter. Shropshire War Memorials, Sites of Remembrance. 2013. YouCaxton Publications. 177. 978-1-909644-11-3.
5. Book: Shropshire War Memorials, Sites of Remembrance. 191–192.
6. Bronze half-length bas-relief portrait sculpture, circa 1931. In Leeds General Infirmary, Great George Street Entrance Hall. Inscribed below: IN MEMORY OF JOSEPH WATSON FIRST BARON MANTON A MEMBER OF THE BOARD OF THE INFIRMARY FROM 1906 TO 1922 A WISE COUNSELLOR AND GENEROUS BENEFACTOR. Signed bottom left of Lord Manton's robe: "Allan G Wyon". Unveiled Friday 11 December 1931 by his widow Claire, Lady Manton (Source: Yorkshire Post, 12 December 1931, p.14, which erroneously states by "W. Wyon", his famous relative the sculptor William Wyon, who died in 1851)
7. https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Old_Leeds_School_of_Medicine,_memorial_to_Guy_Alfred_Wyon Commons category:Old Leeds School of Medicine, memorial to Guy Alfred Wyon
8. Web site: The School Seal London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine LSHTM. www.lshtm.ac.uk. 25 September 2015. https://web.archive.org/web/20111021072515/http://www.lshtm.ac.uk/aboutus/introducing/seal/index.html. 21 October 2011. dead.