evening, as will appear from the following invitation, which was sent to Benjamin West, Esq.
"Royal Academy, 30th day of Oct. 1769.
"SIR,
"You are desired to meet the President, and the rest of the Visitors, at the Royal Academy, in Pall-Mali, on Friday next, the 3d day of November, at seven o'clock in the evening, to examine the layman.
"I am. Sir,
"Your most humble servant,
"F. M. Newton, Sec. R.A."
John Bacon, whose father Thomas was a Cloth-worker, was born in London on the 24th of November, 1740, and was employed, when a boy, in a Pottery at Lambeth, and afterwards by Mrs. Coade, in her Artificial Stone Manufactory,[1] during which time he obtained no fewer than nine prizes in the Society of Arts. Mr. Bacon commenced carving in marble in 1763.
- ↑ Mrs. Coade's Artificial Stone Manufactory was erected in the year 1769, at the King's Arms Stairs, Narrow Wall, Lambeth. In a descriptive catalogue of the contents of this manufactory, published in 1784, what were at that time deemed the advantages of Artificial Stone, are minutely se forth. At page 82, of Nichols's "History and Antiquities of the Parish of Lambeth," speaking of this establishment, the author says, "Here are many statues, which are allowed by the best judges to be master-pieces of Art, from the models of that celebrated artist, John Bacon, Esq.
