Extracts from “The History of Devizes” by James Waylen (1859) regarding local memories of the young Thomas Lawrence living at the Bear Inn, Devizes with his family.

There is also a brief biography of him by Waylen. There are some charming stories told about the young Lawrence and his family. (Pages 447 to 456)

Thomas Lawrence, the father of the well known painter afterwards known as Sir Thomas Lawrence President of the Royal Academy, came from Bristol to Devizes in 1772, at the time when his little son was three years old. His wife who had borne the maiden name of Lucy Read and the sobriquet of " the beauty of Tenbury," was distantly related to the house of Powis, and therefore of gentle blood, an honour which Lysons the antiquary endeavoured to establish for the family of Lawrence also. One who saw the younger Lawrence when a child described him a remarkably handsome, with large bright eyes and a voice unusually sweet. His father soon turned his good looks and fine voice to advantage, and taught him the art of spouting select passages from the poets for the entertainment of customers. Before he was five years old, the child had stood on a table, held out his right arm, and recited to the wondering guests speeches from Milton and odes from Collins.

Left an early pastel drawing of the singer Maria Linley - she died in 1784 when Lawrence was 14. He had moreover at this infantine age discovered the faculty of drawing portraits, which he did with such fidelity as to likeness and such rapidity of execution, that his father usually introduced him to his visitors with "Gentlemen, here is my son: will you have him recite from the poets, or take your portraits." In Mr. William Russell's recent sketch of the President's life, this scene is described as of frequent occurrence in the smoking room of the Bear, when the farmers, on Thursdays, were closing the business of the day over their brandy and water. These no doubt constituted a large proportion of Mr. Lawrence's most valuable customers, but his constitutional ambition must have made him still more solicitous to introduce the youthful prodigy to the notice of the fashionable travellers who thronged the inn in those posting days.

Such we know to have been the case. Prince Hoare who while stopping at Devizes once heard him recite Milton's "Lycidas" and was shown some of his drawings of eyes and hands, reported in the highest terms both of his declamatory and of his pictorial powers. He was even at the age of ten taken to London and introduced to Sir Joshua Reynolds who pronounced him, (so declared the fond mother), the most promising genius he had met with; a fact not generally noticed by his biographers.

Another distinguished visitor at the Bear, who was early struck with his precocity, was David Garrick the actor, who listened complacently while the little boy, urged by his father, recited a long passage from Shakespeare. On the great actor's return within the space of a month, as he alighted he called out "Landlord, has Tommy learned any more speeches, eh?" and forthwith ordered the boy and his tea to be taken to a summer house in the garden, saying, "Come now, my man, begin"; and when the tea and spouting were finished, he patted him on the head and said "Bravely done Tommy, whether will you be a painter or a player eh ?" Tommy, both then and for some time after, imagined it seems that he could be both. Mrs. Siddons it is said added her praise to that of the multitude, declaring that his voice and recitation was harmonious and his action just. With admirers came advisers. The Rev. Dr. Henry Kent of Whistley House Potterne proposed that a boy of such natural powers should have suitable instructors, and lent him Rogers 'Lives of Foreign Painters.' But the father was averse to his reading on the subject, "though," said he, "I have no objection to his studying the old masters and visiting the neighbouring picture galleries." Tom was accordingly taken to Corsham House. He was lost during the tour of the apartments, and was found gazing upon a picture by Rubens. "Ah I" he sighed, as he was led away, "I shall never be able to paint like that."

Touching the Dr. Kent here referred to, an old gentleman of recluse habits and seldom seen abroad unless mounted on a veteran white charger, it is further reported that he made Master Tommy's acquaintance through the following circumstance. One day he drew his bridle at the door of the Bear Inn, and summoning the landlord, demanded to be shown a representation of himself and horse which he understood had given birth to much merriment at his expense. Mr. Lawrence was entirely ignorant of the affair, but immediately suspecting the truth, sent for his son, who leading his father and the Doctor upstairs exhibited to them on the wall of one of the bedchambers a sketch which both were fain to acknowledge was a veritable likeness. The old gentleman, so far from retaining any resentment towards its author, led him to the shop of Mr. Thomas Burrough, and requested him to make choice of a variety of books.

At the age of six, Tommy was sent to the school of one Jones near Bristol; he afterwards received lessons from Lewis a Dissenting minister at Devizes, and finally was placed under the tuition of Mr. Jarvis a schoolmaster in the same town, and the predecessor of the late Rev. John Ludd Fenner. Of young Lawrence's schoolmates at this establishment, Sir Anthony Perrier late Mayor of Cork and the Rev. Charles Lucas, were, we believe, both contemporary, and to the last Sir Anthony retained an affectionate remembrance of his early days in their society.

The graphic pen of a lady-novelist has so well depictured the interior life of the Lawrence family at this point in their history, that we gladly proceed to make room for a passage from the Diary of Miss Burney (afterwards known as Madame D'Arblay, but at that time attendant on the Queen,) in the form of a letter written to one of her friends.

"Bath, 7 April 1780. "My Dearest Susy. …and the third day we reached Devizes. And here Mrs. Thrale and I were much pleased with our hostess Mrs. Lawrence, who seemed something above her station in her Inn. While we were at cards before supper, we were much surprised by the sound of a piano-forte: I jumped up and ran to listen whence it proceeded. I found it came from the next room, where the Overture to the Buona Figliola was performing. The playing was very decent, …we heard the sound of a voice, and out I ran again. The singing however detained me not long, and so back I whisked. But the performance, however indifferent in itself, surprised us at the Bear Inn at Devizes! and therefore Mrs. Thrale determined to know from whom it came. Accordingly she tapped at the door. A very handsome girl about thirteen years old, with line dark hair upon a finely formed forehead, opened it. Mrs. Thrale made an apology for her intrusion, but the poor girl blushed and retreated into a corner of the room. Another girl however advanced and obligingly and gracefully invited us in and gave as all chairs. She was just sixteen, extremely pretty, and with a countenance better than her features …… We found they were both daughters of our hostess, born and bred at Devizes. We were extremely pleased with them, and made them a long visit which I wished to have been longer ….the wonder of the family was yet to be produced. This was their brother, a most lovely boy of ten years of age, who seems to be not merely the wonder of their family but of the times for his astonishing skill in drawing. They protest he has never had any instruction, yet showed us some of his productions which were really beautiful. Those that were copies, were delightful, those of his own composition amazing, though far inferior. I was equally struck with the boy and his works. We found that he had been taken to London and that all the painters had been very kind to him, and Sir Joshua Reynolds had pronounced him (the mother said) the most promising genius he had ever met with. Mr. Hoare has been so charmed with this sweet boy's drawings, that he intends sending- him to Italy with his own son. . . . This house was full of books as well as paintings, drawings, and music; and all the family seem not only ingenious and industrious, but amiable: added to which they are strikingly handsome. I hope we shall return the same road, that we may see them again. . . ."

The earliest pictorial performance of young Lawrence of which these is any distinct record must be the sketch which in after life he presented to Mrs. Forster the accomplished daughter of Banks the sculptor. Written under it were the words "Thomas Lawrence, Devizes" and on one side "Done when three weeks [years?] old, I believe." See Allan Cuningham's British Painters vi. 235. Another, said to have been painted when he was little more than seven, consists of two portraits (Mr. and Mrs. Kenyon) and like all his others at that time was executed in the most unpremeditated manner, during the brief sojourn of the originals at his father's house of business. His early portraits continued for many years to be painted either in crayons or in water colours, two or three good specimens of which may be seen in the Dulwich Gallery. A similar one, being the portrait of Miss White of the Castle Inn at Marlborough, was for many years in the possession of Mr. Thomas Burrough Smith of Devizes In the autumn of 1830 her present Majesty, then the Princess Victoria, being on her way, in company with her august mother the Duchess of Kent, to visit Erlestoke House, stopped at the Bear Inn at Devizes; and recalling the fact that this spot was the scene of Sir Thomas's early career, enquired if any of his productions were still extant in the town. Mr. Smith's specimen was soon conveyed to her, and remained in her possession while the party visited Erlestoke. The Princess even made a copy of it, while waiting there for horses to carry her on to Stonehenge. Two years after her coronation, Her Majesty purchased the picture for 150 guineas and placed it in the Royal Collection.

The elder Lawrence was a somewhat pretentious but at the same time a very public-spirited man; rather too much so for his own pocket. His erection of signal posts across Salisbury Plain has already been mentioned. In 1776 there was a large fire on the Green, and Lawrence, ever foremost in action, was speedily on the spot, and by the assistance of his men and his single engine, succeeded in extinguishing the flames.

A noted highwayman named Thomas Boulter was marauding the neighbourhood and committing the most impudent robberies on every one whom he met. Whilst the inhabitants of Devizes were entering into a subscription to procure his discovery and commitment, Lawrence sent out a party of horsemen on his own account, who scoured the country but, as might be expected, returned without effect. With all his energy, Lawrence failed in business and left Devizes in 1781, but not before his little son had found many opportunities of practising his art in connexion with persons of influence and distinction.

At the age of ten Tommy was already in possession of sufficient celebrity to command a public notice and panegyric on his pretensions in a work retaining its popularity to the present day " The Miscellanies" of the Hon. Daines Barrington. When the family therefore left Devizes, it was not without hopes that the rising fortune of the son would open a new field of success. They went first to Weymouth which was then visited by Royalty, but met with little encouragement. The next experiment appears to have been made upon Oxford and with decided success. The boy had not been unnoticed by the chiefs of the University who stopped at Devizes on their way to Bath; and when he appeared in their city and announced himself as a portrait painter, many flocked to his eazel. Among his early patrons here were the Bishops of Oxford and Llandaff, the Earls of Bathurst and Warwick, and the Countess of Egremont, Nor was his pencil confined to celebrities such as these, for the youth and beauty of the classic city and its neighbourhood "equally pressed upon his talents."

From Oxford, the Lawrences passed after a single season to Bath, and by this time his celebrity was established. We may here record a visit to Tenbury in Worcestershire, the vicarage of which town had been the scene of his father's romantic marriage with the fair maid of Tenbury. The date of this visit is indicated by a crayon portrait preserved at the neighbouring seat of Stanford Court, and inscribed on the back "Thomas Lawrence 1785." Two years later, he went to London and took a house in Leicester Square, near that of Sir Joshua Reynolds. This was in 1787. At the age of 24 he was made a Royal Academician; and eventually he became President of that Institution.

In natural disposition, Sir Thomas Lawrence was one of the most amiable of men, and was ever an affectionate son and brother. This was strikingly shown when, as a youth, he received from Sir Henry Harpur the splendid offer of £1000 to enable him to study in Italy. The support of the family at that time depending wholly on his exertions, he instantly agreed with his father in declining the .advantage. He was the youngest of sixteen children, all of whom, with the exception of himself and two daughters died in infancy. Facsimile crayon-etchings of the portraits of his father and mother (now very rare) are in the possession of Mr. Henry Bull of Devizes.