Francis Leggatt Chantrey - Life

Life

Francis Leggatt Chantrey was born at Norton near Sheffield (when it was part of Derbyshire), where his father, a carpenter, had a small farm. His father died when he was twelve; and his mother remarried, leaving him without clear career to follow. At fifteen, he was working for a grocer in Sheffield, when, having seen some wood-carving in a shop-window, he requested to be apprenticed as a carver instead, and was placed with a Mr Ramsay, woodcarver and gilder, in Sheffield. His artistic merit was spotted by John Raphael Smith, a distinguished draughtsman and engraver, who gave him lessons in painting. In 1802 Chantrey paid £50 to buy himself out of his apprenticeship with Ramsay (despite only having 6 more months to serve). He immediately set up a studio as a portrait artist in Sheffield, which allowed him a reasonable income. He collected sufficient funds to move to London.

Chantrey obtained work as an assistant wood-carver, but at the same time devoted himself to portrait-painting, bust-sculpture, and modelling in clay. Asked later in life, as a witness in a court case, whether he had ever worked for any other sculptors, he replied: "No, and what is more, I never had an hour's instruction from any sculptor in my life". He travelled to Dublin, where he fell very ill, and lost all his hair. He then returned to London and exhibited pictures at the Royal Academy for some years from 1804, but from 1807 onwards devoted himself mainly to sculpture. The sculptor Joseph Nollekens showed recognition of his merits. In 1807 he married his cousin, Miss Ann Wale, who had some property of her own. His first imaginative work in sculpture was the model of the head of Satan, which was exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1808. He afterwards executed for Greenwich Hospital four colossal busts of the admirals Duncan, Howe, Vincent and Nelson; and so rapidly did his reputation spread that the next bust which he executed, that of John Horne Tooke, procured him commissions to the value of £2,000.

From this period he was almost uninterruptedly engaged in paid work. In 1819 he visited Italy, and became acquainted with the most distinguished sculptors of Florence and Rome. He was chosen an associate (1815) and afterwards a member (1818) of the Royal Academy, received the degree of M.A. from Cambridge, and that of D.C.L. from Oxford, and in 1835 was knighted. He died after an illness of only two hours' duration, having for some years suffered from heart disease, and was buried in a tomb constructed by himself in the church of his native village in Derbyshire (now Sheffield).