Context 152 - November 2017

C O N T E X T 1 5 2 : N O V E M B E R 2 0 1 7 33 GRANT ELLIOTT Violet Pinwill, woodcarver This year is the 60th anniversary of the death of a woman whose career of more than 50 years produced a body of work that can be seen in more than 300 churches in Devon and Cornwall. The lateVictorian era saw a period of church restoration and renovation across the whole of the country, includ- ing a flourishing of woodcarving.Within Devon, three woodcarvers’ names are particularly distinguished. Harry Hems, Herbert Read and Violet Pinwill are all now recognised for outstanding contributions to local woodcarving in the second half of the 19th century. Harry Hems arrived in Exeter in 1866. He was not only a gifted carver but also a very successful business- man. At one time he employed over 80 craftsmen and his business, the Ecclesiastical Art Works, became a worldwide enterprise. Herbert Read, a former employee of Harry Hems, set up his own business, the Saint Sidwell Art Works, also in Exeter, in 1892. Violet Pinwill was the third force in woodcarving in Devon. Based in Ermington and then Plymouth, she and her sisters carried out work across Devon and deep into Cornwall. Her success is all the more remarkable, given the status of women in Victorian society. St Peter and St Paul, in Ermington, Devon, has a body of Violet Pinwill’s woodcarving stretching across the whole of her working life. She was born in 1874, and her first woodcarving in the church dates back to 1890, when she was just 17 years old. Her final piece of woodcarving in the church is the second-world-war memorial plaque, after 1945, carved when she was 71 years old. Violet Pinwill died in 1957, and 2017 marks the 60th anniversary of the death of this remarkable woman. In 1880 the Reverend Edmund Pinwill moved from Lincoln and became Rector to Ermington. He raised sufficient funds to restore the church under the guid- ance of the architect EH Sedding.The restoration was complete in 1889. While the restoration works were under way, Mrs Pinwill engaged the workmen to teach her seven daughters woodcarving. Subsequently, three of the Pinwill sisters, Mary Rashleigh, Annie Ethel and Violet Alice, became professional woodcarvers. Mary Rashleigh appears to have been the initial driving force.The sisters set up a woodcarving company called Rashleigh Pinwill and Company, and moved to Plymouth in about 1893. Fortunately, the business was continuously patronised by EH Sedding, who commissioned woodcarving from the sisters for his church projects. The sisters’ partnership did not last for long. In 1900 Mary married and she subsequently retired from the business. Later, in 1908, Annie moved to Kingston- upon-Thames, Surrey, and took up a woodcarving career there.This leftViolet in charge of the Plymouth woodcarving business, which she continued up to the age of 82. She was widely known in theWest Country and there are more than 300 churches in Devon and Cornwall with examples of her work, even after accounting for the loss of much of her woodcarving in Plymouth, destroyed during the bombing of the early 1940s. As well as new commissions, she also undertook restoration of ancient woodwork, and was in demand for carving regimental and ships’ coats of arms. According to her obituary in TheTimes in 1957, Alice Pinwill was modest and unassuming, carried out her extensive business without a secretary, and never owned a car. She was a devout Christian and dedicated her craft to celebrating God’s work. A memorial plaque in the Lady Chapel of the church of St Peter and St Paul, Ermington, reads: ‘Remember before GodViolet Alice Pinwill… She studied to show herself approved unto God a workman that needth not to be ashamed. She walked humbly with her God all the days of her life.’ The pulpit at Ermington is possibly Violet Pinwill’s first piece of woodcarving in the church. It is an octagon in plan with woodcarving panels on six sides, the other two sides remaining open for access. According to the local congregation, the angel faces at the base of the pulpit are based on the faces of the Pinwill sisters themselves. The first panel shows St Peter healing a child at Samatia. The second shows the Pentecost. The third shows Jesus giving the keys of the kingdom of heaven to St Peter.The fourth shows the conversion The pulpit at St Peter and St Paul, Ermington