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Merton and Morden
has been fortunate in the local connections made with it by men who were
giants in their time, including St. Thomas à Becket, Lord Nelson and
William Morris, who established his print works here in 1881.
Sturdy and solid in build as a sailor, Morris was a man of striking
appearance with a riot of strong curly hair and beard, and was often a
useful model for his artist friends, Rossetti and Burne-Jones. Esther .Meynell
has described him as a “man of volcanic energy, not only the leading spirit
of the Morris business, but a poet, a writer of prose tales, an active
working socialist, a preacher at street corners, and the creator of the
great Kelmscott Press.” To this may be added that he was the founder and
secretary of the Society for the Protection of Ancient Buildings, treasurer
of the National Liberal League, secretary of the Eastern Question
:association, one of the organisers of the Iceland Famine Fund, founder of
the Socialist League, a frequent lecturer on the decorative arts, and the
translator of Beowulf and many of the Icelandic sagas. Strength for all
these activities he derived from a direct and simple character ; all his
friends and acquaintances testify to his outstanding personality and his
best friend, Burne-Jones, most vividly and truthfully of all when he says:
“he was a rock of defence to us all, and a castle on top of it, and a banner
on top of that.”
Morris was born in 1834 at Walthamstow of kind and wealthy parents of Welsh
extraction and was educated at
Marlborough
School and Exeter College, Oxford. Although professionally trained both as
an architect and painter, his large private means enabled him to devote
himself to practising the decorative arts at his leisure, and from his
personal experience of decorating his own first married home, the Red House,
Upton, Kent, grew the firm of Morris and Co. William Morris, then aged
twenty-eight, and his friends launched this company in 1861 with a capital
of just over £100 and small premises in Red Lion Square. Describing
themselves as “Fine art workmen in painting, carving, furniture and the
metals”, the members of the firm proceed to give their reasons for setting
up in business: “These artists, baring for many years been deeply attached
to the study of the decorative arts of all times and countries, have felt
more than most people the want of some one place, where they could either
obtain or get produced, work of a genuine and beautiful character. They have
therefore, now established themselves as a firm for the production by
themselves of mural decoration either in pictures or pattern work, carving
as applied to architecture, stained glass, metal work including jewellery,
furniture including embroidery and stamped leather, and all these as applied
to dwelling houses, churches or public buildings.” The original firm enjoyed
a moderate but expanding success, and removed to bigger premises in Queen
Square. New crafts were added to those of the original prospectus, such as
painted tiles and table glass, then wall-paper stamped with wood-block
printed designs, and after 1865 weaving, dicing and printing on cloth. These
last three eventually became the principal activities of the firm and
necessitated the move from London to Merton in 1881.
Mr.
Herbert A. El1is has described the situation of the Merton Abbey Works:
“seven acres of lush meadows bounded and intersected by the Wandle's
,windings, with their rambling quaint buildings of tarred weatherboard and
red tile, scattered promiscuously among the willows. These buildings stand
now (1904) as they were erected, early in the eighteenth century, by a
family of Huguenot refugees for use as a silk weaving factory.” The Wandle
there also turned a water- wheel, and supplied water of the special quality
required for madder dyeing. There was also a dwelling house (destroyed by
enemy action in 1940) but Morris rarely stayed there, usually travelling
each day from Hammersmith to Farringdon Street
by the Underground, across the City, and down to Merton Abbey Station from
Ludgate Hill by train, a journey of two hours. Morris refused to pull down
any of the original workshops though he had the roofs raised to accommodate
his Looms and the foundations damp-proofed. Carpet looms were also built and
pits dug and lined for the indigo vats, and eventually a complete set of
dye-shops and bleaching grounds were arranged.
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