Samuel Knight Samuel Knight .
Knight was born in Exeter on 3 September 1834 [1] to Samuel Knight and Mary Boalch Anning., [2] living in his early life at Summerland Street, St Sidwell, Exeter. [3] He was educated at Exeter Cathedral School. [4] His father was a master statuary (sculptor) with work on a number of Devon churches. [5] [6] [7] His paternal grandfather (Lewis) was also a stonemason. [8] Samuel's sister, Mary Charlotte Knight, was the mother of the artist Robert Anning Bell (1863-1933), [9] who was articled to Knight for three years. [10]
Knight was articled to William Gilbee Habershon and Edward Habershon (d. 1901) in 1854 and remained for 16 years as Chief Assistant. He became an Associate of the Royal Institute of British Architects on 17 March 1873 (proposed by T H Wyatt, E Habershon and T Roger Smith) and a Fellow of RIBA on 10 Feb 1879 (proposed by T H Wyatt, W Emerson and T Roger Smith). He was in partnership with Henry Spalding (1832-1910) from around 1871 [11] and in independent practice from 1878. [4]
In 1879, Knight won a competition (from amongst 18 entries) to design Devonport Public Hall in Fore Street. [12] Costing some £10,000 and opened in 1881, it provided space for concerts and other public gatherings with the occasional use as a theatre. The hall was converted into the Electric Cinema in 1909 with seating for 700, and then further enlarged in 1931 to seat 2,300. The cinema was destroyed by German bombs on 24 April 1941. [13]
In 1882-83, Knight designed The Drill Hall, in Chenies Street, London, for the Bloomsbury Rifles, a volunteer unit in which Knight was at the time a captain (and later an Honorary Major). [14] [15] The building is now known as RADA Studios and is a grade II listed building with English Heritage. [16] He also designed a number of private dwelling houses and other buildings in North Finchley, including the family home during the 1890s, Netherelms on Woodside Avenue. [17] With Henry Spalding RIBA he also designed a prestigious villa for a solicitor's family (with connections to the Andrews family of Gainsborough's Mr & Mrs Andrews) called Belle Vue House in Sudbury, Suffolk. [18]
Woodside Hall and Assembly Rooms, adjoining Woodside Park station, erected in 1885, at the sole cost of Henry Holden esq. proprietor of the Woodside Park Estate, form a structure of brick with stone dressings, in the Elizabethan style, from designs by Mr. Samuel Knight, architect, of London, and include a hall 70 by 30 feet, available for public meetings, concerts and dramatic performances, with a suite of retiring rooms...
— Kelly's Directory of Middlesex, 1895
Woodside Hall became Woodside Park Synagogue in 1950.
Knight directed the £1600 rebuilding of St Andrew's Church, Hempstead, Essex, in 1887-8; excluding the chancel, Harvey chapel and tower. [19]
He designed a number of country houses, some for friends, and laid out several suburban estates.
He wrote "The influence of business requirements upon street architecture" describing the changes in city buildings that have taken place during the nineteenth century. [20]
Knight was a regular correspondent with The Times and other newspapers in the 1890s and had a number of letters published relating to his profession, the activities of the railway companies, and local issues such as the landscape around Richmond Hill. [21]
He was active in a number of other fields including being a liveryman in the Worshipful Company of Shipwrights, Honorary Architect for the Association of Conservative Clubs, Honorary Major in Bloomsbury Rifles, and he kept his Devon roots with membership of the committee of Devonians in London and attendance at their gatherings. His personal papers show a keen interest in astronomy (for example, in the return of Halley's Comet in 1910).
Following the premature death of his first wife Hannah Oliver (née Tutton) in 1867, [22] Knight married Helen Wilden in 1868, with whom he had 9 children, 7 of whom survived infancy, the other two dying of tuberculosis. [23] 1891 census records show they had six daughters and one son at that time. Helen died in 1892. His home address between 1891 and 1901 was 7 Downe Terrace, Richmond Hill. [24] He married his former housekeeper, Amelia Salt, in 1906 and moved to Higham Park. [25] His residential address at the time of his death was 32 Selwyn Avenue, Higham Park. [26]
In February 1904, a Receiving Order was made against Knight under the Bankruptcy Acts 1883 and 1890. [27]
Knight died on 8 May 1911 in West Ham Union Infirmary, Leytonstone, leaving some £2360 with probate granted to his son, Arthur Wilden Knight. [28]
Henri Farman was a British-French aviator and aircraft designer and manufacturer with his brother Maurice Farman. Before dedicating himself to aviation he gained fame as a sportsman, specifically in cycling and motor racing. Henri acquired French nationality in 1937.
Sir George Gilbert Scott, largely known as Sir Gilbert Scott, was a prolific English Gothic Revival architect, chiefly associated with the design, building and renovation of churches and cathedrals, although he started his career as a leading designer of workhouses. Over 800 buildings were designed or altered by him.
Sir William Brandon of Soham, Cambridgeshire was Henry Tudor's standard-bearer at the Battle of Bosworth, where he was killed by King Richard III. He was the father of Charles Brandon, 1st Duke of Suffolk.
Alfred Ablett was a British Army soldier and a Crimean War recipient of the Victoria Cross, the highest award for gallantry in the face of the enemy that can be awarded to British and Commonwealth forces. A soldier with the Grenadier Guards during the Crimean War, he was awarded the VC for his actions on 2 September 1855, during the siege of Sebastopol.
Gabriel Donne or Dunne was an English Cistercian monk and was the last Abbot of Buckfast Abbey in Devon, before the Dissolution of the Monasteries.
Colonel Sir Robert William Edis was a British architect.
The following is a timeline of the history of the city of Exeter, Devon, England.
James Leakey (1775–1865) was an English landscape and portrait artist.
Sir Oliver Lyle, OBE (1891–1961) was a British sugar technologist during the early 20th century.
Frederick George Slessor (1831–1905) was a British railway engineer who worked in England, India, South Africa, and continental Europe.
Robert Coltman Bolam was an English footballer who made 79 appearances in the Football League playing as an outside forward, mainly at outside right, for Sheffield United, Darlington, South Shields and Queens Park Rangers.
James Harwood Panting was a British writer who specialised in school stories for boys. He was the editor of Young Folks and a member of the editorial staff of the South London Press.
Albert Edward Kingwell was an English architect, surveyor and land agent who was one of the first to use concrete in his practice. He oversaw the Jack Estate at Hadley Wood in Hertfordshire for more than 50 years.
William Franks was a landowner in East Barnet, Hadley Wood and Cheshunt, and the owner of a large estate in the former Enfield Chace.
William Allen Dixon (1821–1893) was a British architect who specialised in the design of churches and particularly Baptist churches. His heyday was in the late 1860s to the early 1870s when he designed at least five church in England, several of which are grade II listed buildings.
Samuel Walker (1714–1761), called Samuel Walker of Truro, was an English evangelical clergyman of the Church of England.
Hannah Courtoy, born Hannah Peters, was a London society woman who inherited a fortune from the merchant John Courtoy in 1815. Her distinctive Egyptian-style mausoleum in London's Brompton Cemetery has been the subject of considerable curiosity and speculation ever since a report by Reuters in 1998 repeated claims that it contained a working time machine.
Thomas Talbot was a beverage bottler of Gloucester who founded the Talbot Mineral Water Company in 1845. In 1886, he was elected high sheriff of Gloucester and later became an alderman of the city.
Reginald Crompton was a British solicitor, stage actor and silent film screenwriter. A bass-baritone, he created several minor roles in the Savoy Operas with the D'Oyly Carte Opera Company.
St Mark's Church was a Church of England church in Dawlish, Devon, England. It was built between 1849 and 1851 as a chapel of ease to the parish church of St Gregory. It closed as a place of worship in 1974 and was demolished in 1976. The site is now occupied by residential dwellings.