Hogarth and his World

The Foundling Hospital, London

The Foundling Hospital was established by Royal Charter in 1739 after a tireless campaign throughout the 1720s and 1730s by Thomas Coram, who made his fortune as a shipbuilder in the American colonies.  G. M. Trevelyan describes the period as “an age of aristocracy and liberty; of the rule of law and the absence of reform; of Latitudinarianism above and Wesleyanism below; of the growth of humanitarian and philanthropic feeling and endeavour; of creative vigour in all the trades and arts that serve and adorn the life of man.”  The Foundling Hospital represents that trend towards public philanthropy which sought to reconcile personal wealth with public virtue.  It also represented a new moral attitude that insisted that children were born innocent and should not be punished for the sins of their parents. In this respect John Locke’s ‘Some thoughts concerning Education’ (1693) was highly influential.  He argued that a person’s moral character is formed during childhood and that children could be moulded through education to develop into virtuous adults.

Thomas Coram was a social outsider but he had strong connections with the establishment, notably with the Prime Minister Robert Walpole and his brother Horatio.  With their help he persuaded George II to grant the Royal Charter and building began in 1742 on Lamb’s Conduit Fields which site was bought from the Earl of Salisbury.  

 The Building was designed by Theodore Jacobsen, an amateur architect of German descent who was a steel merchant by profession.  He was also a Hospital Governor so he offered his services free of charge.  His assistant was John Sanderson and the Surveyor was James Horne who was replaced in 1751 by Henry Keene.  The design reflects a strong Palladian architectural influence but ornamentation is kept deliberately plain as the charity did not wish to be accused of extravagance, but this is also in keeping with the English Protestant style of baroque architecture which keeps the Palladian proportions but eschews extravagant rococo decoration.

 A temporary building was acquired in Hatton Garden during the building of the main Hospital and this opened its doors to children in 1741.  The West wing for boys was completed in 1745 and the East wing for girls in 1752.  The Hospital’s Chapel built between 1747 and 1752 was formally opened in 1753.  Located between the two wings, its completion was partially financed by concerts given by Georg Frederic Handel who was also elected a governor.

A most notable feature of the Hospital which was a private charity is the part played by the artists of the day in financing it.  This reflected a sea-change in the status of artists and musicians who had up until this date been dependent on aristocratic and royal patronage subsisting on meagre pensions and treated as servants by their great masters.  The rise of the prosperous merchant class and a good grasp of commercial techniques allowed artists like Handel and Hogarth to make considerable fortunes without the need for aristocratic patrons.  Handel had begun as a court composer but tiring of his subservient position switched from opera to oratorio which was presented in the form of a subscription concert.  In this way he achieved financial independence.  Hogarth similarly made his money independently through the sale of engravings and prints which enabled him to maintain his position as a satirical observer of the evils and hypocrisy of his time. 

 The Foundling Hospital benefited from the donation of the works of many of the finest artists of the day and by making its collection available to the public it became in effect the nation’s first public art gallery.

 Inside the Hospital building are several fine original 18^th century interiors.  In one there is an exhibition of foundling tokens, small items, sometimes just a button, given by mothers on leaving their babies in the hope that they would one day be able to return to claim them and by these tokens be able to identify them.  Few of them returned and the Hospital retained them.

 The Committee Room, which is where mothers were interviewed before leaving their children, contains a fine painting by Hogarth, The March of the Guards to Finchley of 1750

The Picture Gallery is also an original 18^th century interior.  In the Court Room, where the Court of Governors used to meet, there is more display as this room was designed to impress future governors and donors.  The ceiling is a plaster work by William Wilton.  The paintings on display include Hogarth’s Moses before Pharoah’s daughter and Gainsborough’s picture of London Charter House.

William Hogarth is featured as a character in The Devil and the Bag of Nails by Carol Richards now exclusively available on Kindle from www.amazon.com