Charleston Loan Exhibition

53 Born in Bristol, England, Thomas Coram immigrated to Charleston in 1769, where he became a well-known land- scape artist, master engraver and miniaturist. In 1788, he advertised “Coats of Arms, Cyphers, ornaments, names, devices, &c. on plate, seals, or copper plate for impressions cut in the neatest manner.” 1 From his shop, he engraved lockets and bracelets and sold hair jewelry. A master die-sinker, he cut several seals for Charleston’s social and phil- anthropic organizations. Made in 1805 for the Circular Congregational Church of Charleston, this seal depicts the church as it was designed by Robert Mills: a domed center structure with protruding six-column portico and steeple. In reality, the steeple was never completed. The church burned in the fire of 1861—the seal survived the blaze—and what remained of the 1806 structure was destroyed in the earthquake of 1886. In addition to engraving, Coram was recognized as a successful artist, who rendered some of Charleston’s most notable structures and local vistas. Largely self-taught, he mastered the picturesque style by studying and copying the works of British masters such as Thomas Gainsborough (1727–1788), Reverend William Gilpin (1724–1804) and Paul Sandby (1725–1809). Charles Fraser, Charleston’s famed miniaturist and understudy of Coram, said, “he was, truly a self-taught artist; seeking information from books, practice, and the conversation of artists who occasionally visited Charleston.” 2 The most well known of his landscapes are the oil sketches rendered at Mulberry Plantation, seat of the Broughton family and a once thriving eight-hundred-acre plantation. The focal point of this scene is the plantation house, built circa 1711 by infamous planter, Indian trader and politician Thomas Broughton (d. 1737). An example of baroque- style architecture, Broughton’s mansion was informally dubbed “Mulberry Castle” for its four attached flankers with bell-shaped roofs that resemble castle turrets. 3 This impressive brick structure is seen beyond the two rows of single- room slave cabins, which, together with the field hands, underscore the source of the family’s wealth. Although later replaced with wood-framed or brick structures, many early slave dwellings in South Carolina were constructed in the vernacular building traditions of coastal Africa. Coram’s view records remnants of these practices in the cabins’ simple form and tall, thatched roofs. Although the slave cabins are no longer standing, the main building remains; it is now under the most comprehensive easement ever received by the Historic Charleston Foundation. BSC 1. Anna Wells Rutledge, Artists in the Life of Charleston: Through Colony and State From Restoration to Reconstruction (Philadelphia: American Philosophical Society, 1949), 123; Martha R. Severens and Charles L. Wyrick, Charles Fraser of Charleston (Charleston, SC: Carolina Art Association, Gibbes Art Gallery, 1983), 22. 2. William Dunlap, History of the Rise and Progress of the Arts of Design in the United States , Vol. 1 (New York: George P. Scott, 1834), 242. 3. St. Julien Ravenel and Harriott Horry Ravenel, Charleston: The Place and the People (London: The McMillan Company, 1906), 65. Thomas Coram (American, 1756-1811) View of Mulberry, House and Street Charleston, SC, ca. 1805 Oil on paper. H. 4 ⁄/!^ x W. 6 ⁄⁄/!^ inches (unframed); H. 11 fi/* x W. 12 ‡/* x D. 2¼ inches (framed) Lent by Gibbes Museum of Art/Carolina Art Association, Charleston, SC, 1968.018.0001 Thomas Coram (American, 1756-1811) Engraved seal Charleston, SC, 1805 Silver Diam. 2½, D. 1½ inches Engraved on front: ·Church·SOC·Relief· Clerg y·S o· Carolina, Incorp·A·D1789 ; Engraved on back: arrow through the center, Tho Coram Sc., and 1805 Lent by Circular Congregational Church, through The Charleston Museum, Charleston, SC, IL2001.001