Fouracre & Son
Fouracre & Son of Plymouth was a leading stained glass businesses in south-west England.
The business was established by John Fouracre (1818-83), who had trained as a plumber. He formed a partnership with his son, John Thomas Fouracre (1844-1915), in 1866, and expanded the business to include painting and decorating. The latter included ecclesiastical commissions, such as the chancel of the Church of St James the Less , Plymouth (destroyed in World War Two).
Expansion into stained glass production was facilitated by the arrival Henry Watson (1842-1920), and the firm became known as Fouracre & Watson, under which name it traded until 1890. Watson was born in Newcastle, but came to Plymouth from Exeter where he had worked with Alfred Beer and Frederick Drake. The first recorded window by the new firm is a two-light window of 1873 at Emmanuel Church, Mannamead, Plymouth. (The church has a number of windows by the firm produced over a number of years and so provides an interesting study in its changing style.) A further prestigious early success in 1873 was the commissioning of nine windows for Plymouth Guildhall, a project it shared with Heaton, Butler & Bayne. (The windows were lost in the Plymouth Blitz.)
When Watson retired in 1890 and the firm reverted to its original name of Fouracre & Son. Although John Thomas Fouracre continued to lead the firm until his death in 1915, these years were increasingly influence by the artistic style of William David Snell (1862-1928), who having joined the firm at an early age, would progress to leading the business between Watson’s death and his own in 1928.
Following Snell’s death the business was taken forward by another long serving employee, Edwin Reuben Phillips (1879-1951). Work continued at the firm’s historic base at Chapel Street, Stonehouse until it was destroyed in the Plymouth Blitz. The business then merged with Osborne and Son, and traded as Osborne & Phillips into the 1960s.
Sources:
Fouracre & Son, Stained glass Manufacturers of Plymouth, A Celebration of their Work by Graham Naylor (Old Plymouth Society, 2018)
Stained glass windows in Cornwall by the Plymouth firm of Fouracre by Michael G Swift