Henry Styleman le Strange: Tractarian, Artist, Squire

Abstract

The life of Henry Styleman le Strange illustrates a number of significant factors in the development of the Tractarian Movement and its relationship with the arts. He was a devout layman who wished to advance the practice of Tractarian worship and spirituality. He did this by encouraging Tractarian worship in the churches on his estates and by appointing Tractarian clergy to livings of which he was patron. He was himself a distinguished amateur artist and architect, who was modesdy influential in the nineteenth-century ideal for exploring the interrelationship between the self-dedication of the artist to moral and religious truth, and Christian art. This can be seen in his own artistic work, in the tower and nave roofs at Ely Cathedral, and his collaborations with other architects, notably Butterfield. As important as his own work is his influence as a patron, not merely in restoring churches on his estate or in the development of a seaside resort, but in the pattern that emerges of his friends and acquaintances also commissioning his favoured architect.