page_title: Edward James Willson
section_title: Life
hierarchical_section_title: Edward James Willson / Life
caption_attribution_description: English: w:Pelham's Pillar
context_page_description: Edward James Willson, F.S.A., was an English architect, antiquary, architectural writer, and mayor of Lincoln in 1851-2.
context_section_description: Born at Lincoln on 21 June 1787, he was the eldest son of William Willson (1745-1827) of Lincoln by his wife Clarissa, daughter of William Tenney. Robert William Willson was his younger brother. He was brought up a Roman Catholic, and, after education at the grammar school in the Greyfriars, Lincoln, he joined his father’s building company. His father was a cabinet maker and joiner, but also described himself as a ‘‘master-builder’’. He was working as a woodcarver in Lincoln Cathedral around 1805 when a chance meeting with John Britton led to his friendship with the latter and developed his interest in architectural writing. He is said to have received some architectural training from a local architect This is likely to have been William Lumby, a Lincoln architect, who was also the Cathedral surveyor.
  By 1817 Willson had established himself as an architect when he was engaged by Archdeacon Henry Vincent Bayley in the restoration of Messingham church. This was followed by his superintendence repairs or restorations of churches at Haxey, Louth, West Rasen, Saundby, Staunton,  South Willingham and other churches in Lincolnshire and Nottinghamshire. He designed St John the Evangelist's Catholic Church, Nottingham and other Roman Catholic chapels at Hainton, Louth, Melton Mowbray, Grantham, and which are early examples of the Gothic revival. 
  His first major project was the Grade II listed St Saviour's Church, Moorgate, Retford, 1829, which was the first of four parish churches he designed. The building has largely survived intact. In 1826 he designed the organ case for Lincoln Cathedral. Following his appointment as Surveyor to the County Committee in 1833 he was between 1834 and 1845 responsible for he restoration of the keep, towers, and walls of Lincoln Castle.
  The Pelham Column, 128 feet high, on a hill at Cabourne between Caistor and Grimsby, was designed by Willson for the Earl of Yarborough. He was honoured as a citizen in Lincoln, and became a city magistrate in 1834 and mayor in 1852.
caption: Pelham's Pillar, 1843-48
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