Charles Bell Birch

[2] As a child he showed artistic promise, and at the age of twelve[3] he was admitted to study at Somerset House School of Design.

[3] Birch returned to England in 1852 and became a student at the Royal Academy of Arts, gaining two medals.

[5] Birch won a significant prize of £600 in an open competition in 1864 from the Art Union of London for his marble work The Wood Nymph, which was judged to be the "best original figure or group".

[3] It was subsequently selected as one of the representative works of British art for the Vienna, Philadelphia and Paris Exhibitions.

[6] Subsequently, at least eight copies of this statue were cast in bronze for locations in Britain and throughout the British Empire.