Reginald Cholmondeley


Reginald Cholmondeley of Condover Hall, Shropshire, was an English landowner, artist and collector. He was a Justice of the Peace and Deputy Lieutenant of Shropshire and held the rank of Major, 1st battalion 28th Shropshire Rifle Volunteers. The Condover estate passed to him on the death of his brother, Thomas, in 1864.

Early life and education

Cholmondeley was born on 20 April 1826 at Hodnet, the third son of Charles Cowper Cholmondeley of Chester, rector of Hodnet, Shropshire and Mary Heber. His eldest brother, Thomas, was a Major of the first Administrative Battalion of the Shropshire Rifle Volunteers; another brother, Charles, was a Catholic priest; his youngest brother was the Reverend Richard Hugh, the rector at Hodnet, whose daughter was the novelist Mary Cholmondeley.
He attended Trinity College, Cambridge where he matriculated in 1845, obtaining a B.A. in 1849, M.A. in 1856 and was admitted at the Inner Temple on 18 January 1850, but not called. He trained as a painter and sculptor in the 1850s.

Condover

In March 1863, following the death of his cousin, Edward William Smythe Owen, Thomas Cholmondeley inherited Condover Hall and the large estate adjacent, and took the name of Owen as a condition of the inheritance. A year later he married Victoria Alexandrina Cotes, daughter of John Cotes and Lady Louisa Jenkinson, daughter of Charles Jenkinson, later 3rd Earl of Liverpool and a godchild of Queen Victoria. He travelled to Italy for his wedding tour and in Florence he was "seized with a malignant fever" on 10 April and died there on 20 April 1864. His brother, Reginald, who had met him in Florence, carried back his remains to England, and he is buried in Condover churchyard.
In the parish church at Condover there is a marble monument to Thomas Cholmondeley by George Frederic Watts, featuring a kneeling bearded figure of the deceased, wearing boots, a cloak and a soldier's tunic, with his hands clasping a sword, looking out across the choir stalls in front of him, into the chancel.
The Condover estate devised to Reginald on the death of his brother, Thomas, in March 1864. His country seat, Condover Hall, is generally regarded as "the finest stone manor-house in Shropshire." As well as being a considerable landowner, Cholmondeley was an enthusiastic amateur sculptor of some accomplishment. Many of the elaborate sculptural decorations at Condover Hall are his work. He also owned a house in London. Originally in single occupation as No. 37 Palace Gate, this large red-brick house at the corner with Canning Place was built in about 1869–70 for Reginald Cholmondeley, to whom Cubitts granted a ninety-nine-year lease from September 1870, at £100 per annum. The architect was Frederick Pepys Cockerell, who also worked for Cholmondeley on the restoration of his country seat, Condover Hall.
Other building projects he was responsible for as squire of Condover included, at the parish church the rebuilding of the chancel and mortuary chapel in which his family monuments are contained, and the internal restoration of the nave in 1878 at a cost to himself of around £5,000. He also built the Church of England village school.

Marriage

On 17 October 1867 at Rostherne, Cholmondeley married Alice Mary Egerton, daughter of William Egerton, 1st Baron Egerton of Tatton and Charlotte Elizabeth Loftus, daughter of John Loftus, 2nd Marquess of Ely. His younger brother, the Reverend Richard Hugh Cholmondeley, officiated at the ceremony.
His new wife was an artist and a poet and the couple were well-suited but the marriage would be short-lived. Alice died in childbirth on 27 November and was buried on 3 December 1868; her infant daughter, Alice, died three weeks after her mother, on 11 December and was buried on 19 December at the parish church at Condover.
In the Church of St Mary and St Andrew, Condover, there is a very affecting monument to Alice Cholmondeley that was sculpted by her husband of one year. It features a recumbent effigy of Alice, with her infant daughter by her side and an empty cradle at her feet. Cholmondeley also sculpted the recumbent effigy of his cousin, Blanche Heber, at St Luke's Church, Hodnet.
In 1871 he published Poems by A.C., a volume of poems by his late wife and dedicated to Robert Browning, and in 1875, Emblems, a volume of her drawings. A presentation copy of the latter was given to the banker, George Rae.

Landowner and collector

Cholmondeley was "a man of powerful personality and fine taste", an accomplished artist and talented amateur sculptor as well as an enthusiastic collector of books, manuscripts, paintings and curiosities. He had exhibited at the Royal Academy and counted many of London's artists such as G. F. Watts and John Everett Millais as personal friends.
His circle of friends also included the poet and playwright, Robert Browning, poet, biographer and translator, Sir Theodore Martin, whose portrait he painted, and Lady Martin as well as the American writer, Mark Twain and his wife, who visited Condover in 1873 and 1879.
On 2 July 1881 Olivia Clemens received from their friend Reginald Cholmondeley a letter of condolence on the death of her husband in Australia; startling enough, though in reality rather comforting than otherwise, for the reason that the "Mark Twain" who had died in Australia was a very persistent impostor.
When he wrote to Twain to apologise for the mistake the humourist graciously replied:
Cholmondeley owned a number of rare books as well as valuable paintings, among them Elizabethan, Old Masters and many more; armour and Birds of Paradise that he purchased from the ornithologist, John Gould.

Books

The most important books in his library were:
16th-century and 17th-century portraits of English kings, queens and courtiers, including:
English School:
French School:
Dutch School:
Spanish School:
Italian School:
and others.
Venetian School:
By the 1890s Cholmondeley found himself in debt as a result of his extravagance. Over the years he had spent on Condover Hall, its contents and gardens, what was needed for the estate, which became "so neglected and encumbered" that he was planning to sell it when he died in 1896, having for some time rented it to a nephew.

Death

He died on 10 February 1896 at Hodnet and was buried on 13 February at the parish church at Condover. The Condover estate passed to his younger brother, the Reverend Richard Hugh Cholmondeley. The Condover estate and the collections of books, paintings, furniture and armour were sold in 1897. The Condover estate was purchased in 1897 by Edward Fielden, who later sold it in 1926.