View source for William Silas Spanton

{{short description|English painter}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=April 2022}}
[[File:William Silas Spanton. Portrait by his daughter Helen Margaret "Madge" Spanton.jpg|thumb|right|William Silas Spanton, by Helen Margaret Spanton, (1927)]]
'''William Silas Spanton''' (1845 – 27 December 1930) was a British artist, art historian and photographer based in [[Bury St Edmunds]] in [[Suffolk]].
Born at 42 Abbeygate Street in [[Bury St Edmunds]] in [[Suffolk]] in 1845, the son of [[William Spanton]] (1822–1870) and his wife Sarah ''née'' King (1820–1909). William Spanton Snr had established his 'Repository of Arts and West Suffolk Photographic Establishment' at 16 Abbeygate Street in Bury St Edmunds by 1864.<ref name=Archive>[https://www.suffolkarchives.co.uk/collections/spanton-jarman-photographic-collection-k505/ Spanton-Jarman Photographic Collection] – Suffolk Archives: [[Suffolk County Council]] website</ref> His son William Silas Spanton studied painting at the [[Royal Academy of Arts]] in London where he was sponsored by [[Edwin Landseer|Sir Edwin Landseer]],<ref>{{Cite book|title=An Art Student and his Teachers in the Sixties|last=Spanton|first=William Silas|publisher=Robert Scott, Roxburghe House, Paternoster Row|year=1927|location=London}}</ref><ref name=":0">{{Cite book|title=Charles Fairfax Murray|last=Elliot|first=David B.|publisher=The Book Guild, 25 High Street|year=2000|isbn=978-1584560302|location=Lewes, Sussex|pages=131}}</ref> exhibiting there in 1867 and 1868. When his father died suddenly in 1870 aged just 47 he was forced to abandon his studies to return to his native town to support his mother and siblings by taking over the family business as a photographer, carver, gilder and artist.<ref name=Archive/><ref>[https://www.buryfreepress.co.uk/lifestyle/nostalgia-william-silas-spanton-a-picture-from-the-spanton-jarman-collection-9056273/ William Silas Spanton – a picture from Bury St Edmunds' Spanton Jarman collection] – [[Bury Free Press]] 8 December 2018</ref> He developed the business by introducing picture framing and glazing along with the sale of art supplies while also making a successful sideline as an optician. In 1876 in Bury St Edmunds he married Sarah ''née'' Pechey (1847–1917), the sister of the Bury St Edmunds printer Elisha Pechey. With his wife he had three children: the artist and [[suffragette]] [[Helen Margaret Spanton]] (1877–1934); Dorothy Spanton (1879–1925) and Arthur Pechey Spanton (1880–1916), who was killed in the [[Battle of the Somme]] during [[World War I]].<ref>[http://www.hadleywood.org.uk/uploads/1/4/5/7/14571008/hadley_wood_war_memorial_-_october_2018_version_final.pdf Arthur Pechey Stanton – Hadley Wood War Memorial]</ref><ref>{{Cite web|url=https://suffolkartists.co.uk/index.cgi?choice=painter&pid=854|title=Helen Margaret Spanton – Suffolk Painters}}</ref><ref name=Sussex>[https://suffolkartists.co.uk/index.cgi?choice=painter&pid=853  William Silas Spanton – Sussex Artists website]</ref>
[[File:William Silas Spanton c1890.jpg|thumb|left|William Silas Spanton c1890]]
Although forced by family circumstances to give up a career as an artist Spanton maintained an interest in painting and built up a reputation in his home area as a skilled copier of original paintings. The family home was often visited by artist friends from his student days at the [[Royal Academy of Arts]]. He and his daughter Helen Margaret Spanton were lifelong friends with the [[Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood|Pre-Raphaelite]] artist and collector [[Charles Fairfax Murray]] and his wife who often visited them at Bury St Edmunds and in London, sometimes spending Christmas with them.<ref name=":0" /> Their extensive correspondence, kept at the [[Dulwich Picture Gallery]], is of particular interest as a source of information about Charles Fairfax Murray, the Pre-Raphaelites and the Victorian art world.<ref name=":0" /> His oil on canvas copy of a portrait of [[Augustus Hervey, 3rd Earl of Bristol|Augustus John Hervey, 3rd Earl of Bristol]] after [[Joshua Reynolds|Sir Joshua Reynolds]] (c1900) is in the collection of the [[National Portrait Gallery, London|National Portrait Gallery]] in London.<ref>[https://www.npg.org.uk/collections/search/person/mp08155/william-silas-spanton Copy of a portrait of Augustus John Hervey, 3rd Earl of Bristol by William Silas Spanton] – [[National Portrait Gallery, London|National Portrait Gallery]] Collection</ref> In 1901 while he carried on with the family business in Bury St Edmunds his wife Sarah and daughter [[Helen Margaret Spanton]] went to live with his brother-in-law Elisha Pechey at his home in [[Hadley Wood]] in [[London Borough of Barnet|Barnet]].
Later in 1901 Spanton sold the family business along with its collections of negatives to Harry Isaac Jarman. Spanton joined his family in Barnet where he began a new career as an artist, portrait painter and copyist in oil.<ref name=Sussex/> His family were strong supporters of [[women's suffrage]] – his artist daughter [[Helen Margaret Spanton]] was a prominent militant [[suffragette]]; on their census return for 1911 they wrote, "Four members of this family demand Votes for Women".<ref>1911 census of England, Greencroft, the Crescent, Hadley Wood, William Silas Spanton household.</ref>
Spanton was seriously injured in a motoring accident at [[Blackheath, London|Blackheath]] on 24 December 1930 aged 85 and died of his injuries on 27 December 1930 at [[St Alfege's Hospital]] in [[Greenwich]]; in his will he left £8,269 to his daughter Helen Margaret Spanton.<ref name=Sussex/><ref>[https://www.ancestry.com/interactive/1904/31874_221707-00452/2519281?backurl=https://www.ancestry.com/family-tree/person/tree/15674513/person/19259606923/facts/citation/68040243885/edit/record England & Wales, National Probate Calendar (Index of Wills and Administrations), 1858–1995 for William Silas Spanton 1931 – Ancestry.com {{subscription required}}]</ref>
Spanton, his wife Sarah and daughter Helen are buried in the family grave at [[Charlton cemetery|Charlton Cemetery]] in [[Greenwich]].
==Publications==
* 1920: ''[https://archive.org/details/dli.ministry.01734 A Discursive Handbook on Copying with Special Reference to the Lives and Work of the Two Great Masters of Method, Reynolds and Gainsborough]'' London: [[Winsor and Newton]]
* 1927: ''An Art Student and his Teachers in the Sixties'', London:Robert Scott, Roxburghe House, Paternoster Row
* 1933 ''Bury St. Edmund's: Its History and Antiquities'', London: E. J. Bower
==References==
{{reflist|2}}
==External links==
*[https://artuk.org/discover/artists/spanton-william-silas-18451930 William Silas Spanton] on [[Art UK]]
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Spanton, William Silas}}
[[Category:1845 births]]
[[Category:1930 deaths]]
[[Category:Artists from Bury St Edmunds]]
[[Category:Alumni of the Royal Academy Schools]]
[[Category:English male painters]]
[[Category:19th-century English painters]]
[[Category:20th-century English painters]]
[[Category:19th-century English artists]]
[[Category:20th-century English male artists]]
[[Category:19th-century English male artists]]