Known professionally as Christopher Webb, he was a stained glass designer. Christopher Rahere Webb was a son of Edward Alfred Webb and a nephew of Sir Aston Webb. His middle name, Rahere, refers to St Bartholomew's whose gatehouse his two relatives had jointly restored.
This image is a 1963 example of his maker's mark.
Our colleague, Andrew Behan, advises that Christopher Rahere Webb was born on 5 February 1886 in Chislehurst, Kent (now Greater London), the fifth of the seven children of Edward Alfred Webb (1850-1929) and Emily Fuller Webb née Howes (1853-1896). He was baptised on 27 March 1886 in Chislehurst and his birth was registered in the 2nd quarter of 1886 in the Bromley registration district, Kent (now Greater London).
His six siblings were: Harold Edward Webb (1878-1944); Geoffrey Fuller Webb (1879-1954); Marjorie Mary Webb (1881-1966); Helen Laming Webb (1884-1975); Stephen Foster Webb (1888-1958) and Edward Oliver Webb (b.1892).
In the 1891 census he was shown as aged 5 years living at 21 East Ascent, Hastings, Sussex, with his brother Stephen Foster Webb, together with a 21-year-old female domestic nurse servant. He attended Rugby School at Lawrence Sheriff Street, Rugby, Warwickshire, leaving in 1903 to enrol in the Slade School of Fine Art at University College London, Gower Street, London, WC1.
When his father completed the 1911 census return form he was shown as aged 25 years, a stained glass artist, residing in a 12 roomed property at 9 Harley Road, South Hampstead, London, with his father who described himself as a widower and a wholesale druggist, his brother Edward Oliver Webb who was a medical student, together with a cook, a parlour maid and a housemaid.
According to the Balsham.net website:- 'In I914, with the outbreak of the First World War, Webb joined the Artists' Rifles, holding the rank of Lieutenant and later of Acting Captain. He fought in the trenches at Loos, utilising his artistic training to devise camouflage schemes which he inspected from the air, flying in an early Sopwith'. The website also contains much information about this man including a photograph of him.
In the 1920 edition of the Post Office London Directory he is described as an artist in stained glass at 11 New Court, Carey Street, Lincoln's Inn, London, WC2. Electoral registers for that year confirm that he was entitled to vote in local elections as occupying premises at this address although his abode was still 9 Harley Street, South Hampstead, London, for general elections.
On 23 October 1926 he married Mary Curtis Marsh (1903-1987) in St Bartholomew the Great Church, West Smithfield, London, EC1A 9DS, where in the marriage register he is shown as aged 40 years, a bachelor and a master glass painter living at Church House, Cloth Fair, London, EC1, whilst his wife was shown as aged 23 years, a spinster and an artist residing at Ferndale, Buryfields, Guildford, Surrey, the daughter of Frederick Richard Marsh (1866-1948) a gentleman. They had two sons: John Christopher Webb (1929-1994) and Martin Webb (1932-2005).
The 1939 England and Wales Register confirms his date of birth and that he was a master glass painter living in Kingswood, Stogumber, Taunton, Somerset with his wife and children.
The London S-Z telephone directory in 1947 lists him at 27 Clarence Road, St Albans, Hertfordshire. Probate records confirm this address and show that he died, aged 80 years, on 15 September 1966. Probate was granted on 13 January 1967 to Barclays Bank Ltd and his estate totalled £16,162.
