Edward Hodges Baily

Baily was born on 10 March 1788, at Downend in Gloucestershire, to Martha Hodges (1755–1836) and William Hillier Baily (1763–1834), a woodcutter who specialised in carving ship's figureheads. At the age of fourteen he was placed as an accounts clerk in a mercantile house, where he worked for two years, though he continued to produce wax models and busts, his childhood hobby. In 1804, aged sixteen, he abandoned his job and set himself up as a professional wax portraitist. Two Homeric studies, executed for a friend, were shown to the sculptor John Flaxman who was so impressed, that in 1807, he accepted Baily as a pupil in his London studio and subsequently employed him as an assistant. At the academy he won a silver medal in 1809 and in 1811 he gained their gold medal for a model of Hercules restoring Alcestis to Admetus, and soon after exhibited Apollo discharging his Arrows against the Greeks and Hercules casting Lichas into the Sea. Baily was elected an Associate member of the Royal Academy in 1817 and, on the strength of Eve at the Fountain, a full Academician in 1821. Baily's nephew was William Hellier Baily, the paleontologist. Baily died at 99 Devonshire Road in Holloway, London, on 22 May 1867, aged 79, and is buried on the western side of Highgate Cemetery. ==Selected public works==

1815–1829 }} 1830–1839 1840–1849 1850 and later Church monuments and memorials Throughout his career Baily was responsible for creating a number of monuments and memorials for British churches and cathedrals. Examples include • A tablet with two marble full-length angels, to Samuel Paynter, of Richmond at St Mary Magdalene, Richmond. • Several memorials in the Church of St Nicholas, Lintn Hill, Maidstone, at St James, Uttoxeter Road, Stoke-on-Trent and at St John the Baptist, Devizes • Memorial with kneeling female figure, Church of the Holy Trinity, Ardington, Oxfordshire • Memorials to Peter Denys, died 1816, and to Lady Charlotte Denys, died 1835, Church of St Mary, Easton Neston, Northamptonshire • Two memorials, to Benjamin Newcombe (1818) and to George Gostling (1854) in Church of St John the Baptist, Egham High Street • Memorial plaque to A Walker Heneage, died 1828, in the Church of St Swithin, Compton Bassett • Memorial tablet for Elizabeth Bell (1829), Church of St James, Lincolnshire • Large memorial to J. Spearing, died 1831, Church of St Mary, Potterne, Wiltshire • Memorials to John Ogle, died 1831, and to Sara Ogle, died 1846, in the Church of Saint Mary Magdalene, Whalton • Memorial, with medallion bust, to Bishop John Jebb, died 1833, in the Church of the Holy Trinity, Clapham Common, London • A chancel wall plaque 1836, Church of St Andrew, Heddington, Wiltshire • Wall monument to Thomas Botfield, died 1843, Church of St Michael, Hopton Wafers, Shropshire • A memorial with carved figure, 1846, Church of St Mary, Hertfordshire • A sculpture group memorial to John Thackeray, died 1851, Church of St Mary the Virgin, Lewisham High Street, London Other works • The Victoria and Albert Museum in London has Baily's Marius among the ruins of Carthage, a plaster model for a full-size marble sculpture he exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1833. The museum also has a marble bust by Baily of an unidentified man from 1850. • Five statues in niches representing Christ and the Evangelists, after originals by Bertel Thorvaldsen, in the Church of St Margaret at Grittleton, Wiltshire. • Marble bust of John Flaxman in the Royal Academy with a copy, c. 1836 in Coade stone in the British Museum. ==References==