Mary Thornycroft (née Francis; 1809 – 1 February 1895) was a British sculptor who sculpted many different busts, fragments and statues.

These included The Four Seasons, a series of life-size statues of Victoria's children that were much praised and reproduced as engravings and in several art journals.

[3] The drawing-room at Osborne House contained nine life-size marble statues of the young princes and princesses that were modeled by Thornycroft.

As a woman her commissions were limited therefore, she capitalized on her craft on subjects that were easily reachable for her to study, notably infants and children.

It is known that the couple, along with their son Hamo Thornycroft, worked together during 1875 on The Poets' Fountain at Hyde Park Corner in central London and which was damaged beyond repair in a World War II air raid.

[3] Thornycroft gave sculpting lessons to Princess Louise who was one of Queen Victoria's daughters and who became a notable sculptor in her own right.

[7] The Thornycrofts had six children who grew to adulthood, two sons (Hamo and John Isaac), and four daughters (Alyce, Theresa, Helen and Frances).