The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1890-12-07
A SCULPTOR'S CAREER.
Taunt Thompson, the Famous American
Sculptor, in the jefferson Market Police

Iaunt Thompson, the Famous American
Sculptor, in the jefferson Market Police
Especial to THE HERALD-Examiner Dispatch
New YORK, Dec. 5.-Taunt Thompson,
the sculptor and academician, stood yester-
day in the pen of the Jefferson Market
police court. One would have hardly
singled him out as different in any way
from his companions in misery. His I'M
shaved face was adorned with a moustache
and long, thin imperial his clothing was
of common quality and he wore a soiled
flannel shirt. Yet his artistic hand has
chiselled many famous pieces of sculpture.
Thompson had been drinking with
more than usual abandon for the
! last two or three weeks and Tues
day night had an attack of delirium
tremens. After smashing things up pretty
generally, he was seized with the idea that
he was being pursued by beetles and barri-
caded his door to keep them out. A
| policeman's aid was invoked, the door was
broken open and the sculptor was arrested.
A friend of Thompson'S appeared against
| him and he was sentenced to Blackwellis
| island for month, ut the expiration of
which time he will be examined as to his
sanity.
Il have known Thompson since 1851. y
!
friend he has left. 1t is another case of a
man of genius sacrificing friends, fame and
fortune to drink. Thompson is connected
with some of the best people in New York
He has been drinking to excess for fifteen
years. His wife, who is sister to Bishop
Potter, still sticks TO him, although they
have not lived together for years Phomp-
son was an Irish lad who came to this
country when very young. He studied
anatomy in the Albany Medical college in
1856, and later studied sculpture. after
which he came to New York Soon becom.
ing a member of the Academy of Design
here, he went to Florence, Italy, in 1870,
taking his wife and their Two children. His
life there was an ODD one. He kept aloof
from other artists and sculptors. He
would go on sprees despite the most
earnest efforts of els wife to prevent him.
He had many orders from American pat
rons while there, but neglected his work
This was partly due TO drink and partly be-
cause of his habits of procrastination. |
have known him to spend six or eight
months over small piece that he could
easily have done in two months. Thomp-
son was very intimate with the elder Ben
nett, of the Herald, and made a bust of
Elaine, a character in rennyson's Idyls OF
the King, for James Gordon Bennett, who
has IL in his house IN Paris now. The
statue OF Napoleon, now in the Metropol-
tan Museum OF Art, is MS work: as also is
head of William Cullen Bryant, In the
same place. Perhaps his greatest work is
an equestrian statue of General BURNSIDE
1t is ID feet inches high, and has been
pronounced by experts 10 be one of the
most excellent pieces of equestrian statu
airy ever produced by an American sculp-
tor. 1t was made for the state Of Rhode
Island. He was not prolific, but his WORK
was OF the kind that would make hin
famous if he had not taken to drink.
Among other works of Thompson are the
statues of General Sedgwick at Yves
Point, General Dupont ana General Scott
in Washington; a head of Morse, bust O
the elder Booth for Edwin Booth, tn,
statue of Abraham Pierson, ,iirst presiden
of Yale college, for which Thompson re
ceived the honorary degree of A. M, and
bust Of Ex-Governor Schuyler Crosby, O.
Montana"