HOMAS COTTRELL, described by Mores as à primo proximus of modern letter-founders, served his apprenticeship in the foundry of the first Caslon. He was employed there as a dresser, and the portrait of him which is to be seen in the Universal Magazine of 1750,[590] among a group of Caslon’s workmen, represents him as engaged in that branch of the business.

It is not improbable that he joined with his friend and fellow apprentice, Joseph Jackson, in clandestinely observing the operation of punch-cutting, secretly practised by his master and his master’s son at Chiswell Street; and being assisted by natural ability, and what Moxon terms a “genuine inclination,” he contrived during his apprenticeship to qualify himself not only in this, but in all the departments of the art.

In 1757 a question as to the price of work having arisen among Mr. Caslon’s workmen, Cottrell and Jackson headed a deputation on the subject to their employer, then a Commissioner of the Peace, residing at Bethnal Green. The worthy justice taking this action in dudgeon, the two ringleaders were dismissed from Chiswell Street, and thus thrown unexpectedly on their own resources.

Cottrell, in partnership for a short time with Jackson, and (according to Rowe Mores), assisted also by a Dutchman, one Baltus de Graff, a former {289} apprentice of Voskens of Amsterdam, established his foundry in Nevil’s Court, Fetter Lane. His first fount was an English Roman, which, though it will compare neither with the performance of his late master, nor with the then new faces of Baskerville, was yet a production of considerable merit for a self-trained hand.

In 1758 an incidental record of Cottrell’s Foundry exists in the history, elsewhere recorded, of Miss Elstob’s Saxon types, the punches and matrices of which, after remaining untouched for several years at Mr. Caslon’s, were brought to Cottrell by Mr. Bowyer, to be “fitted up” ready for use. This task Cottrell performed punctually and apparently to the satisfaction of his employer, returning them with a small fount of the letter cast in his own mould, as a specimen of the improvement made in them.[591]

In 1759 Jackson quitted the business to go to sea, and Cottrell, left to himself, busily proceeded with the completion of his series of Romans, which he carried as low as Brevier, a size “which,” says Rowe Mores, “he thinks low enough to spoil the eyes.”[592]

He also cut a Two-line English Engrossing in imitation of the Law-Hand, and several designs of flowers.

[Μ] 73. Engrossing, cut by Cottrell, circa 1768. (From the original matrices.)

The Engrossing, or as Mores styles it, the Base Secretary, was a character designed to take the place of the lately abolished Court Hand in legal documents, and appears to have been designed for Cottrell by a law printer named Richardson. On the completion of the fount, an impression of which we here give, Richardson issued a specimen of it,[593] claiming the design, and representing its advantages as the proper character for leases, agreements, {290} indentures, etc. The matrices, however, remained with Cottrell, and the inclusion of the fount in his general specimen shows that Richardson ceased to retain any exclusive use of it. It was the only fount of the kind in England when Mores wrote in 1778.