Thomas Raffles Davison

[1] His work featured in The British Architect and Northern Engineer for over 40 years from 1874, and he became editor of the publication in 1878 until it merged with The Builder in 1919.

Educated privately at Shrewsbury, he showed a rare talent for drawing from an early age and it was partly for this reason that he was articled to the architect W H Spaull in Oswestry.

His arrival in Manchester coincided with a move by several local architects to set up an architectural magazine to rival the London-based Builder.

Then Sir Aston Webb wrote: Raffles Davidson died on 5 May 1937, aged 84. at his home, “Whistler’s Hollow,” Woldingham, Surrey.

The consolation is that some men are so allured that they end up making very good drawings which are stimulative and useful, whilst they are saved from doing some very bad architecture.