John Edgar Gregan

• Born                      18 December 1813 at Dumfries
• Died                       29 April 1855 at 24 York Place Manchester

John Edgar Gregan was born in Dumfries on 18 December 1813. He received an excellent general education at Edinburgh before being articled to Walter Newall in Dumfries. About 1836 he entered  the office of Thomas Witlam Atkinson in Manchester as an assistant. Following Atkinson’s “financial difficulties,” otherwise bankruptcy, and departure to London, Gregan commenced independent practice in Manchester in or about 1840.

His works included several churches and schools in the neighbourhoods of Manchester, Bolton, and Preston and the chapel of the Diocesan Training School at Chester, - these being in the mediaeval styles; the church of St. John at Miles Platting, and the Presbyterian churches at Greenheys and Ancoats, schools to the latter, and the Jews' School at Cheetham Hill all in the style Northern Italy; several private houses at Manchester and neighbouring towns; warehouses (the class of buildings through which the chief architectural character of Manchester is expressed); the lodges to the public parks of the same city, and other buildings. His best work, however, and it is of great merit, is the bank of Sir Benjamin Heywood Bart., and Company, of which an illustrated account was published in the Builder' (vol. vii.), as was an elevation and plan of one of his warehouses (vol. vlii.). The bank is designed in an adaptation of the Venetian Italian style, with careful attention to beauty of detail. Gregan was an accomplished Renaissance designer and was able to ask Sir Charles Barry, Ambrose Poynter and George Godwin to be his proposers for admission to FRIBA, on 5 February 1849. He was Honorary Secretary of the Royal Institution,  a Member of the Free Library Committee and a Member of the Board of the Manchester School of Design. Henry A Darbishire and Edward Salomons  were numbered among his pupils

John Edgar Gregan died at the early age of 41 at his residence, 24 York Place, Manchester on 29 April 1855, and was buried at St Michael's, Dumfries beside his parents. William Reid Corson who had also trained with Walter Newall moved from Leeds to Manchester to complete Gregan's work, including the Mechanics Institute in Princess Street.

THE LATE MR JOHN GREGAN. The death of Mr John Edgar Gregan at Manchester— as announced in our obituary last week—has occasioned deep regret among his numerous friends in Dumfries. Both as regards intellectual ability and moral worth, he reflected credit on his native town. As an architect, he occupied a high place; he was an excellent musician; and his mind, besides being imbued with the poetry of art, was richly stored with the fruits of acquired knowledge. Modest, gentle, and benevolent, his natural amiability made him a general favourite and while he was beloved a man, the religious graces which adorned his character endeared him to a large circle of Christian friends in Manchester and Dumfries. His loss to the church with which he was connected in the former place deeply felt; and in token of the high estimation in which he was held by its members, the Rev. Scott, its minister, and four of the office-bearers, accompanied the remains of the deceased to this town on Thursday, and were among the band of sorrowing mourners when his dust was committed to kindred dust. ]Dumfries and Galloway Standard 9 May 1855 page 4]

Address
1845        13 Princess Street (Manchester Guardian 9 April 1845 page 4)
1845        13 Princess Street (Manchester Guardian 27-September 1845 page 20)
1847        13 Princess Street (Slater -trades)
1847        16 Cooper Street (removals alterations etc) (Slater)
1850        20, Cooper Street (Slater’s Directory)
1855        J E Gregan, architect. 20 Cooper Street (Slater’s Directory)

Residence
1855        House: 24 York Place, Oxford Road, Chorlton-on-Medlock (Slater’s Directory)

Death Notice    Dumfries and Galloway Standard 2 May 1855 page 8
Death Notice    Manchester Guardian 9 May 1855 page 8
On the 29th ult at York Place, Oxford Road, Mr John Edgar Gregan, architect

Obituary    Builder v 13 12 May 1855 Page 222
Obituary    Dumfries and Galloway Standard 9 May 1855 page 4
Obituary    Civil Engineer & Architect's Journal [London], Vol. 18, June 1855, 217