Allan G. Wyon

"New Birth", by Allan G. Wyon. 1931

Allan Gairdner Wyon FRBS RMS (1882 - 26 February 1962) was a British die-engraver and sculptor and, in later life, vicar in Newlyn, Cornwall.

Many of his works are memorials with a number located in British cathedrals.^[1] Other, more decorative, works include the relief of a male figure representing the East Wind on the London Underground headquarters building at 55 Broadway above St. James's Park Underground Station.^[1]

Biography

Wyon was born in 1882, the son of Allan Wyon FSA (1843–1907) and Harriet Gairdner.^[2] Wyon's father, two of his uncles, his grandfather and his great-grandfather successively held the position of Chief Engraver of Seals to the monarch.^[2]

Wyon attended Highgate School and, like others in his family, studied sculpture in London from 1905 to 1909 at the Royal Academy.^[3] From 1910 to 1911 he was an assistant sculptor to Hamo Thornycroft.^[2] Between 1924 and 1930 he was Honorary Secretary of the Art Workers Guild. He was a Fellow of the Royal Society of British Sculptors and also worked as a die-engraver, but took Holy Orders in 1933. From 1936 until his retirement in 1955, he was vicar of St. Peters Church, Newlyn.^[1]

He married Eileen May Trench in 1910; they had one daughter.^[1] He had three sisters, Olive, and two others. One an Anglican Deaconess and the other a Congregational Minister.

Works

Wyon exhibited a wide range of sculptures, busts medals and engravings at the Royal Academy. He designed commemorative and memorial medals for the Masons, the London Chamber of Commerce, and Lloyd's.^[1]

Sculptured memorials in Salisbury Cathedral by Wyon include those to:^[1]

• Bishop Ridgeway
• Bishop Donaldson
• Lieutenant General Sir George Montague Harper
• Hon. Edward Wyndham Tennant
• Bishop Ken

Other memorials include those to:^[1]

• Bishop Percival, in Hereford Cathedral.
• Bishop Frere, in Truro Cathedral.
• Bishop Walpole, in St. Marys Cathedral in Edinburgh.
• The combined Memorial to William Pitt, 1st Earl of Chatham and William Pitt the Younger, at Hayes near Bromley in Kent.
• Cambrian Railways War Memorial, Oswestry, Shropshire.^[4]
• The figure of St Michael, Shropshire War memorial, Shrewsbury.^[5]
• Female standing figure with laurel wreath, Hinckley and District War Memorial.
• The Richard Corfield Memorial, at Marlborough College.

Other works:

• The Sorrows of Mankind, 1920
• Egyptian Nude, 1917
• Madonna and Child, Newlyn Church Cornwall
• Christ the leader, In the South Transept of St Columb Major Church, Cornwall
• New Birth, 1931, West wall of the baptistery of St Columb Major Church, Cornwall
• Lion on Rock, 1920
• Seal^[6] for the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine
• East Wind on 55 Broadway, headquarters of the Underground Electric Railways Company of London (now London Underground)

References

1. "Obituaries – The Rev. Allan Wyon". The Times (55326). 27 February 1962. p. 15. Retrieved 2009-06-04.
2. Attwood, Philip (2004). "Wyon family (per. c.1760–1962), die-engravers and medallists". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. Oxford University Press. doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/64499. Retrieved 2009-06-04.
3. Wyon, Allan Gairdner, L. Forrer, Biographical Dictionary of Medallists, Volume VI, London 1916, p.580-581.
4. Francis, Peter (2013). Shropshire War Memorials, Sites of Remembrance. YouCaxton Publications. p. 177. ISBN 978-1-909644-11-3.
5. Shropshire War Memorials, Sites of Remembrance. pp. 191–192.
6. "The School Seal | London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine | LSHTM". www.lshtm.ac.uk. Retrieved 2015-09-25.