Williams Tonks & Sons connection to Campaign Furniture.

Williams Tonks & Sons connection to Campaign Furniture.

Our father Christopher Clarke was born in Birmingham to a long line of medical for-bearers however, part of the family tree relates to Henry Tonks. You can follow the link for more in depth information but he was a surgeon whose family owned a brass foundry in the city and was also famous for teaching art at Slade School of Fine Art with Rex Whistler being one of many of his notable pupils.

Image credit  Antique Door Knobs Collectors of America

      The foundry Henry Tonks' family owned were called William Tonks & Sons and though maybe not as well known as Coalbrookedale and Archibald Kenrick were one of the largest and most prolific metalware making companies in Great Britain during the 19th century.  If you are interested in marked metalware do look at Vin Calcutts excellent  The Old Copper Website  and you can read up more on the Tonks Foundry. there as well as identifying other marked metalware.

As you will know, if you are familiar with our website, with Birmingham being the workshop of the world in the 18th and 19th century here and across the country there were a vast amount of metalware manufacturers producing a vast array of goods that could be used for travelling or by makers of campaign furniture.
        Firstly, items in brass and iron such as beds and chairs such as the wonderful folding iron bed  and the iron duoro chair in our last catalogue. As well, as this we have had showers and items such as washstands and shelves which brass components.
        Secondly, there will be the component parts of chests, tables, bookcases etc that have iron or brass fittings. Flush handles, brass strapwork, escutcheons, brass ferules, thumb bolts and threaded fittings to brass hooks and hinges etc.

      So how do William Tonks & Sons fit into picture of what was being produced that could be useful to the campaign furniture cabinet maker or traveller?  Unlike specialist makers such as Winfield or Hoskings who made specific finished items ready to be retailed Tonks made a huge amount of different items that other manufacturers could use in their designs as well as items for use in a more architectural context such as door knockers, window latches  and door plates.
      We have seen W T & S items such as table clips, handles and hinges so it would be reasonable to assume that they also made campaign handles and brass strapwork for campaign chests. Strapwork would not be marked and most campaign or military handles (if they are marked) are marked on the back so you would not know unless you removed them. Interestingly, our father on a visit to the USA over 40 years ago spotted Tonks hinges on an American late 18th bureau bookcase. Tonks exported world wide so pieces of their metalwork will appear on colonial furniture possibly misleading the uninitiated  into thinking the piece is English.
       The box below was certainly English and had hinges by William Tonks.

Travel Box Carlisle & Watts

    We have handled a few other pieces which could be classified as campaign or travel. One of the most iconic pieces of campaign equipage would be the Brighton Bun.  Tonks made a nice example of these which we know because they marked the outside of the dishes. Generally, when we see them of this size they tend to have pressed dishes and light weight sconces. The Tonks examples which would predate these have case dishes and sconces and though small feel more substantial.

           Another piece of brass ware we usually have in stock would be the Walkers Patent hooks. First patented in 1864 they continued to be made into the 20th century and can still be found in William Tonks catalogues of this date. On the earlier examples which come in several sizes they will be stamped Walkers patent 1864 to the front and those made by Tonks will have the WT & S mark to the back alongside the sun motif they used during the period.

At present we have a stylish pair of candelabra marked WT & S which are designed to be screwed on to a wooden base. It is possible that they could have been for use on board ship where falling candlesticks could be particularly dangerous.

William Tonks Candelabra

William Tonks & Sons were an important company who produced an extensive collection of items cast in brass and also in cast iron many of which turn up for sale on a regular basis. They have been somewhat overlooked as a company worthy of research and we can only hope that this small article may be the beginnings of rectifying that situation. As mentioned the company continue into the 20th century when in 1970 they merged with Newman Brothers which was also later bought up by Ingersoll-Rand.  Interestingly, the Newman Brothers and Tonks legacy survives in the form of the Coffin Works  museum which featured in the first BBC series Restoration in 2003. 

As more items come to light this page will be updated with further information.

Simon Clarke

Proof that Campaign Furniture still travels

Another happy customer unpacking his purchase.

Follow the link below to see Christopher Schwarz :

 Unpacking the Douro Chair

Proof that campaign furniture still travels well.

 Christopher Schwarz has also now produced and excellent book introducing campaign furniture to those wishing to produce there own travelling furniture and with the first English-language translation of A.J.-Roubo’s 18th-century text on campaign pieces, plus original drawings of dozens of pieces of British campaign furniture culled from original copies of the Army & Navy stores catalogues.

Campaign furniture book

A brief insight into Naval Campaign Furniture

In the eighteenth century a naval officer was expected to provide his own furniture and ideally it needed to suit the difficult conditions it was used in. That is to say it should be easy to move quickly when the call to clear the decks was given; it should be made to withstand the rigours of life on board ship and it should fit the limited space available whilst still being practical for use.  Lieutenant James Trevenen of the 24 gun frigate ‘Crocodile’ wrote a good description of a typical cabin of a junior officer and his furniture, in his letter of the 17th August 1781 to his brother :

        My habitation, then is six feet square, which six feet is now completely filled up as an egg. My cot in which I sleep is two feet broad and five and a half long, allowing half a foot on each side for swinging (and this is too little when it blows hard). I wish I had not mentioned the cot, for it blows hard now and brings to memory that I shall have a bad night’s sleep. Allowing half a foot then for swinging, my cot will take up just half my cabin and there will be left six feet by three feet. A very small bureau will take up three feet square, and my chair and myself will pretty well complete the rest of the space.   1.

The  two part mahogany secretaire chest illustrated is a little over the size of Trevenen’s bureau and would have been useful to a naval officer in carrying out his administrative duties. With the entering of daily logs, the recording of signals and Admiralty returns this work was substantial and a writing area with drawers and pigeon holes for filing was essential. This chest has a fixed fiddle gallery to the top and handles to the sides. Although you could be forgiven for assuming that these handles were simply for carrying, their greater importance was for tying down in bad weather.

As the chest breaks into two parts it could easily be carried to the hold or put into a boat to be towed behind, when the ship prepared for battle. If it couldn’t be moved quickly or there was no time, it was not uncommon for furniture to be thrown overboard. Indeed at Trafalgar, 10 officers of the Ajax had their cots given to the sea in the haste to be ready for battle. Apart from storage, the furniture was sometimes put to more practical use during battle. It was not unknown for the surgeon to use the midshipman’s chests, lashed together with tarpaulin on which to lay out the wounded sailors, in the absence of a table.  2.

The following illustrations are of a mahogany elbow chair and it can be seen that it is designed to concertina flat quickly. Once the seat is lifted to rest against the back and the two piece arms are released on their brass catches, the hinges on the side rails allow the chair legs to fold so that chair takes up a relatively small amount of space. This chair is typical of a type associated with naval use. Indeed a set of the same design are on board HMS Victory and Treve Rosoman notes that Admiral Edward Boscawen (1711-1761) had a similar set of four plain chairs and one armchair.  3.

Although these two items are good examples of purpose made furniture for use on board ship it is not to say that common domestic furniture was not also used and certainly it would been more affordable to the officer still waiting to make his fortune. The ward-room furniture of the 80 gun Tonnant included a number of Windsor chairs and at Trafalgar they “were suspended by a rope passed from the main to the mizzen mast.”  4.  Forbes Chevers, the ship’s surgeon, retrieved his chair after the battle as a memento, even though it “had part of its legs shot away and another bullet had passed completely through its thick oaken seat.”  4.

Further pieces may be seen on our website www.campaignfurniture.com

References
1. A Memoir of James Trevenen, ed. by Christopher Lloyd & R.C. Anderson, Navy Records Society, 101 (1959) and quoted by Treve Rosoman in ‘Some Aspects of 18^th century naval furniture’- Furniture History Society Journal Vol. XXXIII 1997.
2. Roy Adkin - ‘Trafalgar – The biography of a battle’. Published by Little, Brown
3.‘Some Aspects of 18^th century naval furniture’ by Treve Rosoman - Furniture History Society Journal Vol. XXXIII 1997.
4. Quoted in Roy Adkins, ‘Trafalgar - the biography of a battle’. Published by Little, Brown

Sean Clarke