Archibald Matthias Dunn

• Born                   23 October 1832 at Wylam, Northumberland
• Christening          16 November 1832 at Newcastle upon Tyne, Northumberland
• Married                2 January 1862 to Sarah Ellen, daughter of Hugh Clayton Armstrong (1841-1917) at St Andrew’s Church, Newcastle
• Died                    17 January 1917, “The Wood House” Branksome Park, Bournemouth
• Probate               12 April 1917.  Estate - £36,820

Not to be confused with William Henry Dunn (qv) mayor of Gateshead, who was in partnership with Alderman Matthew Thompson (1822 or 3-1878). at Gateshead. See also death of Matthew Thompson of Thompson and Dunn, architects. [Newcastle Journal 21 May 1878 page 4]

Archibald Mathias Dunn was born at Wylam on 23 October 1832, the son of Matthias Dunn, a mining engineer and manager and one of the first Government Inspectors of Mines for the North-East. His mother was Margaret Warden Hill (nee Rennie) born in Scotland. He was educated at Ushaw and Stonyhurst College before receiving his architectural training in the office of Charles Hansom of Bristol, the younger brother of Joseph Aloysius Hansom of handsome cab fame.

 

 

Dunn returned to Newcastle in 1854 to commence independent practice. As a leading exponent of High Victorian Gothic in Newcastle, he had established a substantial architectural practice by 1870. He now felt the need to take a partner and in 1871 he wrote to Edward Joseph Hansom, the son of his former mentor and ten years his junior, with an offer of a partnership. Hansom accepted and on 1 July 1871 the partnership was formed. There is no evidence of prior friendship between them, but it is certain that they met in Charles Hansom’s office and were acquainted at least. Hansom immediately used his considerable connections for the benefit of the firm. His lifelong friendship with William Bernard Ullathorne (1806-1889), Bishop of Birmingham, led to a number of important commissions in the Midlands, including St. Bernard’s Seminary at Olton in Warwickshire (1873) and the church of St. Catherine of Siena in Birmingham (1875, now demolished). 

 

 

Under the name of Dunn and Hansom, the firm became the foremost Roman Catholic architects in the north-east of England and gained such a reputation for their church building that they received three significant national Catholic commissions, namely the additions to the Catholic colleges of Downside, Stonyhurst and Ushaw.  In 1880 Dunn and Hansom opened a second office at 2 Westminster Chambers, Victoria Street, London with E J Hansom in charge. In theory this should have allowed the partnership to undertake commissions for Catholic churches, chapels, and colleges throughout England, making them one of the few North-east architectural practices to have a reputation outside the region. How long this office survived is unclear. Hanson was living in Kensington at the time of the 1871 census but had returned to Newcastle within ten years. The Building News of April 1890 provided biographical details of Archibald Mattias Dunn as follow:

Mr. Archibald M. Dunn, of 23, Eldon-square, Newcastle-upon-Tyne, is the senior partner in the well-known firm of Messrs. Dunn, Hansom, and Dunn. Previous to being associated with his partner, Mr. Hansom, Mr. Dunn was known in connection with many R.C. churches and other buildings in the North of England, the most notable amongst his churches being the large Romanesque one built for the Dominicans at Newcastle-on-Tyne. Many of his important works have been done in conjunction with Mr. Hansom, such as the colleges and chapels at Stonyhurst for the Jesuits, and the church and college at Downside for the Benedictines—all on a large scale; the College Chapel at Ushaw, St. Bede's College, Manchester (terracotta), and the New University College of Medicine at Newcastle, etc. Amongst the churches in various towns their most important is the new Roman Catholic Church at Cambridge, hardly yet completed, and of which we gave a view in the Building News for June 26, 1885, and we shall shortly give an interior of the building. Mr. Dunn appeared as an author a few years ago, publishing "The Notes and Sketches of an Architect." In the Building News for 28 February last we published the portrait of Mr. Hansom and gave at the same time a list of the more remarkable buildings carried out by this firm, so that a repetition here is unnecessary. Mr. Dunn's portrait is by Mr. Downey, of Ebury street, S.W. [Building News 18 April 1890 page 547]

 

 Throughout his career, Dunn’s work was informed by first-hand study of architecture in Britain and abroad. From his first year in practice, Dunn was an indefatigable traveller, venturing across Europe, North Africa and the Middle East, filling mind and sketchbook with inspiration for his own designs. In doing so, he followed in the footsteps of travellers who had taken the Grand Tour. Professional success enabled him to indulge his passion for travel from an early age. In the same year that he entered practice, Dunn visited the Flemish region of Belgium, sketching the Old Bourse at Antwerp and the Hôtel de Ville at Ghent, notable for its ‘shaped’ gables. As secular buildings, these had little direct influence on his ecclesiastical designs. In 1869, he inherited £60,000 from his father, Matthias Dunn, which permitted more ambitious journeys. Over the next three decades, Dunn travelled widely during the spring and summer months, sketching notable antiquities. Evidence of these tours is provided by a book he produced in 1886, entitled Notes and Sketches of an Architect. Published in Newcastle by Andrew Reid, the volume was the ‘result of many years' studies in divers places.’ and It featured 100 plates of photolithographic reproductions of Dunn’s sketches from Europe, North Africa and the Middle East. In the preface, written on 1 January 1886, the author wished it to be ‘distinctly borne in mind’ that the drawings are sketches only and ‘have no pretentions to be “Finished Drawings”, neither were they intended for publication. In 1889 Dunn also published a pamphlet titled “Mexico and her Resources.” Following his retirement in 1893 and he and his wife Sara immediately embarked on an extensive tour of the Far East and North America, where they visited the key historic monuments and the latest architectural innovations. This journey was documented by Sara in her first book “The World's Highway” (1894), telling of their visit to Japan; having sailed into Nagasaki eastbound from Hong Kong in April 1893 and staying in Japan for about six weeks before crossing the Pacific. This book was followed in 1898 by Sunny Memories of an Indian Winter (of which a second edition appeared in 1900), and, finally, by The Land of the Rosary (1904), a series of studies made in the Holy Land, whither she travelled as one of a private party of pilgrims which included Bishop Chadwick of Hexham and Newcastle.

 

 

Dunn was one of the 27 architects who founded the Northern Architectural Association in 1858 and was President of the Association in 1896. He was not a member of the RIBA until made an Honorary Associate in 1910. A. M. Dunn was also a Justice of the Peace for County Durham.

 

During his retirement, Archibald Mathias Dunn made a study for Cardinal Vaughan of a Cathedral Church for Westminster in the Gothic style, the cost of which he estimated would be £230,000. Cardinal Vaughan then decided then to appoint John Francis Bentley as architect for the cathedral, with instructions to produce a vast nave giving an uninterrupted view of the high altar. Details of Dunn’s scheme were not published until 1906, after the deaths of both J. F. Bentley and Cardinal Vaughan.

 

In 1862 Archibald Mathias Dunn married Sara (or Sarah) Ellen, a daughter of Hugh C. Armstrong of Newcastle upon Tyne and Bromley, Kent. Mrs Dunn is said to have given devoted services to the poor after her marriage. In 1901 Archibald and Sarah Dunn moved to “The Wood House” Branksome Park, Bournemouth, where he died on 17 January 1917.