Silvanus Bevan

Silvanus Bevan (1691-8 June 1765) was born into a prosperous Welsh Quaker family. He left Swansea as a young man and moved to Cheapside, in London. He obtained his "Freedom" from the Worshipful Society of Apothecaries in 1715 having served his seven years’ apprenticeship with Thomas Mayleigh. He established his Pharmacy at Number Two Plough Court, Lombard StreetODNB article by Geoffrey Tweedale, ‘Bevan, Silvanus (1691–1765)’, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, 2004 [http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/46516] , accessed 10 March 2008.] in one of whose rooms Alexander Pope, the poet, had been born in 1688. [Desmond Chapman-Huston, Through a City Archway. London, 1954. p.15.] William Cookworthy was one of his apprentices. ["William Cookworthy 1705-1780: a study of the pioneer of true porcelain manufacture in England" by John Penderill-Church, Truro, Bradford Barton (1972).]

On 9 November 1715, he married Elizabeth, the daughter of Daniel Quare, the royal clockmaker at a Friends' meeting-house in the City. His wedding was attended by Sarah, Duchess of Marlborough, Lord Finch, Lady Cartwright, William Penn, the Venetian ambassador and his wife. [The ODNB article on Quare states:"The weddings [of Daniel Quare's daughters] were lavish affairs attended by nobility, foreign ambassadors and envoys, and leading Quakers including William Penn and George Whitehead": ODNB article by E. L. Radford, ‘Quare, Daniel (1648/9–1724)’, rev. Jeremy Lancelotte Evans, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, 2004 [http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/22942] , (accessed 10 March 2008) .]

His business prospered and he was joined by his younger brother, Timothy Bevan (1704-1786). In 1725 he was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society. In 1743 his letter entitled “An Account of an Extraordinary Case of the Bones of a Woman Growing Soft and Flexible”, was printed in their Philosophical Transactions. It describes his findings having performed a post-mortem examination.

Silvanus Bevan was a skilled carver of ivory and several busts of well-known men are still in existence (he sent one to Lord Cobham, when he was seeking likenesses for statues for his garden at Stowe House Fact|date=March 2008.

His brother, Timothy, continued the business after his retirement. In the nineteenth century, under William Allen and the Hanbury family, Allen & Hanburys became one of the leading pharmaceutical companies in London.

Bevan died in Hackney on 8 June 1765 and was buried at the Bunhill Fields burial-ground.

Further reading

*The Monthly Record, 15 March 1873, No 46, Vol IV.
*'Wedgwood, Flaxman, and an English eighteenth-century portrait carver, Silvanus Bevan.'" Hugh Tait. Proceedings of the Wedgwood Society, No 3 1959. pp.126-132.
*G. Tweedale, At the Sign of the Plough: 275 years of Allen & Hanburys and the British pharmaceutical industry, 1715–1990 (1990).
*A. A. Locke and A. Esdaile, Plough Court: the story of a notable pharmacy, 1715–1927, rev. E. C. Cripps (1927).
*D. Chapman-Huston and E. C. Cripps, Through a City Archway: the story of Allen and Hanburys, 1715–1954 (1954).
*Audrey Nona Gamble, A History of the Bevan family [1923] .
*The letters of Lewis, Richard, William and John Morris of Anglesey, ed. J. H. Davies, 2 vols. (1907–9).
*J. Burnby, ‘A study of the English apothecary from 1660 to 1760’, Medical History, suppl. 3 (1983) [whole issue] .
*Jonathan Marsden. 'William Penn and Sir Francis Dashwood’s Sawmill'”. Georgian Group Journal, vol. VIII 1998, pp.143-150.

References

Notes

There were three prominent Silvanus Bevans in the family.
* Silvanus (I)(1661-1725) the father of the subject of this entry was a burgess of the City of Swansea.
* Silvanus (II) (1691-1765) the apothecary, and
* Silvanus (III) (1743-1830), one of the founders of Barclay's Bank and partner of Thrale's Anchor Brewery. He was a grandson of Silvanus (I).