Steavens, Thomas
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- Steavens, Thomas
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(c.1728 - ?1759), o. s. of Sir Thomas Steavens, Kt. (d. 1738), timber merchant of Southwark and Eltham, Kent; Queen's Oxf. 1744; Dilettanti 1751; FRS.
1749 - 50 Venice and Padua (Aug. 1749 - ), Florence (Aug. 1750) [Sicily]
1753 - 6 Florence (May 1753), Reggio (Jun.), Bologna (Jun.), Florence (Jun. - Jul. 1753), Naples (Jan. 1754); Rome (by Easter 1755; by 31 Jan. - May 1756), Florence (Oct.)
Thomas Steavens was on the Continent from 1747. His diary of a visit to Germany, Bohemia, Vienna, Italy and France 1747 - 52 was at Alscot Park, and some of his letters to Sir Charles Hanbury Williams (to whom he was secretary at Vienna in 1747/8) survive.1
In August 1749 he was in Venice where he met Philip Stanhope; soon afterwards he was critically ill in Padua.2 In May 1750 he was proposed for the Society of Dilettanti by Sir James Gray at Venice (and he was duly elected in March 1751).3 He was presumably the 'Mr Stevens' mentioned at Florence in August 1750 by Horace Mann, who alleged that his mourning (actually for his mother) was for the departed beauty of the Signora Capello.4 Pancrazi dedicated a plate in his Antichita Siciliane [1751 - 2] to 'Tomaso Stevens'. Steavens appears to have visited Sicily; an engraving after Pigonati (almost certainly a Sicilian view, Pigonati being a military engineer who was stationed there), Ruine del tempio d'Esculapio, is dedicated 'all'Illmo Tommaso Steavens cavaliere Inglese'.5
Steavens was back in Italy in 1753. In April Walpole was recommending to Mann 'Mr Stephens ... a young Gentleman now in Italy', brother-in-law of the antiquarian James West, and of 'the greatest and most amiable character'. Steavens was in Florence about May 1753 and in Reggio early in June; he was not well (blaming women for his illness) and he wished, wrote Mann, 'to be warm'. After spending fifteen days in Bologna he returned to Florence at the end of June.6 He was probably the Mr Steavens presented at Court in Naples early in January 1754,7 and the 'Monsu Tomaso Stivens' residing in Rome at Easter 1755, 'Selciata verso S.Sebastianello'.8
In January 1755 Robert Wood in Rome had described 'Young Stephens' as being loyal to Lord Charlemont.9 On 31 January 1756 T. Steavens wrote from Rome to Lord Huntingdon, defending the character of Thomas Patch (who had just been banished from Rome to Florence);10 his letter also reveals he had been working for Cardinal Albani in a secretarial capacity. 'Stevens', the friend of monsignor Piccolomini in Rome, was helping Patch in December 1755/January 1756, and was with Patch in Florence in February 1756.(11) He was in Rome, 'still shining away' in May 1756,12 and in October at Florence Richard Phelps found his friend Steavens 'just ready to depart for England'.(13)
Christopher Hervey later [in 1761] remembered Mr Steavens 'the timber merchant's son, who made a great figure here at Rome four or five years ago. He is dead you know. While he was at Rome he had the pleasure of being in the good graces of the prettiest lady that was then in [Rome]' - the marchioness Gabriele - and 'when she died Mr Steavens did a very popular thing at Rome, which was to give a present of a hundred Roman crowns to some priests to pray for her soul'.14
1. Diary not seen. Hanbury Williams corr. now WSL. See Ilchester, Sir Charles Hanbury Williams, 160-1. 2. Wal.Corr., 20:175n5. 3. Cust, 77. 4. Wal.Corr., 20:175. 5. Added to a
copy of the Stato presenti degli antichi monumenti Siciliani [1767]; note by A. Laing. 6. Wal. Corr., 20:379 and nn7, 8. 7. SP 105/310, f.3 (Gray, 1 Jan. 1754). 8. AVR sa, S.Lorenzo
in Lucina. 9. HMC Charlemont, 1:200. 10. HMC Hastings, 3:114. 11. Patch 1940, 20 - 1. HMC Charlemont, 1:222 - 3, 225. 12. HMC Charlemont, 1:228. 13. Badminton MSS, fms/g 4/4 (23 Oct. 1756). 14. C. Hervey, Letters from Portugal [etc.] 1759 - 61, 3:297ff.