S Van Abbe

S. VAN ABBE

by

Robert J. Kirkpatrick

S. Van Abbe was the elder brother of the illustrator Joseph Abbey – he was also more talented, more prolific, and far better-known during his lifetime.

He was born in Amsterdam, as Salomon Van Abbe, on 31 July 1883, the second son of Maurice Van Abbe (1859-1919), a diamond cutter, and his French-born wife Rachel, née Rose (1859-1952). They had married in Amsterdam on 23 June 1881, and went on to have four children: Isaac (born on 11 August 1882), Salomon, Marianne (born on 27 August 1887), and Joseph (born on 8 December 1888).  Salomon moved with his family to England in 1890, where they initially settled at 51 St. Peter Street, Mile End Old Town. In October 1890 he enrolled at St. Peter’s School (after a brief period at a Dame School), and in November 1892 he entered Parmiter’s School, Bethnal Green. According to an article in The Artist (July 1949) he then received his artistic training at the People’s Palace, Bow; Toynbee Hall; the Central School of Arts and Crafts; Kennington School of Art; and, from around 1905, the School of Photo-Engraving and Lithography at Bolt Court, Fleet Street (where he met the artist and etcher Edmund Blampied, who later married Van Abbe’s sister Marianne). At that time he was apparently living in Herne Hill.

There is no trace of the family in the 1901 census, but in 1903 it is likely that Salomon was doing some professional work, as on 12 August that year he joined the Amalgamated Society of Lithographic Artists, Engravers and Process-Workers, although he resigned six years later. At the time of the 1911 census he was living with his family at 18 Marjorie Grove, Clapham, working as an artist alongside his brother Joseph.

On 3 August 1914, at Mile End Old Town Register Office, he married Hannah Wolff. Born in Bromley-by-Bow on 4 January 1891, she was one of eight children of Jonas Wolff, a frame-maker, born in Holland in 1863, and His wife Helen, née Levy, born in London in 1867. Salomon and Helen went on to have two children: Derek Maurice, born in Wandsworth on 28 December 1916, and Norman Jonas, born in Wandsworth on 26 April 1921.

In the article in The Artist it was said that his initial interest was portrait painting, “but the necessity of earning a living made him seek a more immediately lucrative occupation, so he devoted most of his time to illustrating books and magazines and designing dustjackets.” In an article in The Print Collector’s Quarterly (October 1939), J.H. Pender wrote that Van Abbe’s first job was on a newspaper, but it is not known what this was. Pender recorded that one of his jobs was to “prepare three drawings showing San Francisco in the throes of an earthquake….. He had never seen San Francisco or the results of an earthquake for that matter, but small details such as these were brushed aside and the drawings were prepared.” (This would have been in 1906).

His earliest-recorded work appeared on the cover of the Amalgamated Press’s The Club Room Magazine in November 1913. In 1914, he contributed to The Strand Magazine and Pearson’s Magazine, and he went on to contribute to many more periodicals until shortly before his death – these included The Christian Science Monitor, Hutchinson’s Magazine, The New Magazine, Woman, Cassell’s Magazine of Fiction, The Londoner, The Studio, Cassell’s Magazine, Colour, Outdoor Stories, The Storyteller, The Graphic, The Illustrated Sporting and Dramatic News, The Sphere, The Illustrated London News, The Queen, The Novel Magazine, The Tatler, The Argosy, Britannia and Eve, The Windsor Magazine and The Artist.

Nevertheless, he went on to become an active artist and etcher, specialising in dry-point etchings, especially of the legal profession and political figures. In 1920, when he was living at 27 Moyser Road, Streatham, he exhibited two works at the Royal Academy. He also exhibited there in 1932. In 1923 he was elected an Associate of the Royal Society of Painter-Etchers and Engravers, and in 1933 he was elected a member of the Royal Society of British Artists (RBA), going on to exhibit with the Society almost every year until 1955. He also exhibited at the Paris Salon in 1930 (where he earned an honourable mention) and 1939 (where he was awarded a bronze medal); The Royal Scottish Academy, the Royal Glasgow Institute of Fine Arts, the Royal Hibernian Academy (Dublin), the Royal West of England Academy, the Royal Society of Portrait Painters, and the Royal Society of Artists in Birmingham. He was also an active member of the Streatham Art Society in the 1930s, and he also became a member of the St. Ives Society of Artists in 1936. He was also a member of the London Sketch Club, serving as its President in 1940-41, and a member of the Art Workers’ Guild, becoming President in 1941. In addition, he was a member of the Savage Club.

Some of his best-known dry-points were his series of 12 “London Types”, produced in the 1920s, and his later portrayals of the legal profession – judges, barristers, clerks etc., which were inspired by his time serving on a jury in around 1927.

As a book illustrator, his earliest-known work appeared in Hodder & Stoughton’s The Queen’s Gift Book in 1915. His main body of illustrative work appeared between 1943 and 1955, when he worked with a number of publishers including Blackie & Son (illustrating two books by Percy F. Westerman), Hollis & Carter, the Odhams Press, J.M. Dent & Sons, and William Collins. He was particularly well-known for his illustrations for re-issues of classic children’s novels such as Treasure Island, Little Women and Tom Brown’s Schooldays, published by J.M. Dent & Sons. In 1950 he produced the dustjacket and a coloured frontispiece for Anthony Buckeridge’s Jennings Goes to School, and he went on to do the same for a further four of the next five “Jennings” books, ending with According to Jennings in 1954.

However, it was as a designer of dustjackets that he became particularly well-known.  Unfortunately, there is some confusion between his work and that of his brother Joseph. In his history of the London Sketch Club (The London Sketch Club, Alan Sutton Publishing, 1994) David Cuppleditch referred to Joseph Abbey as “Joe,” and wrote that “Solomon [note the mis-spelling] was the better-known of the two – his nickname was “Jack” in the London Sketch Club but when it came to designing book covers he would often use the nom de plume J. Abbey.” However, it would appear that all the surviving dustjackets that are signed “J. Abbey” are the work of Joseph, as the signature is identical to that on all other Joseph Abbey illustrations.

While Salomon signed some of his dustjackets (and most, if not all, of his illustrations in periodicals and books) as “S. Van Abbe,” and likewise Joseph signed his work “J. Abbey.” there are countless dustjackets carrying the signature “Abbey.” Some sources have tried to distinguish these as being by either Salomon or Joseph by reference to stylistic quirks in different signatures – for example there are at least three variations in the way the letter “y” is produced – but the one constant in all of the “Abbey” signatures is the initial letter “A,” which is always rounded, as it is in all of the “S. Van Abbe” signatures. Joseph always signed his name with an angular “A.”

In the two articles in The Artist, Salomon was said to have designed the dustjackets for novels by Arnold Bennett, John Galsworthy, Dennis Wheatley, Dornford Yates, Agatha Christie, Arthur Conan Doyle, Edgar Wallace, Baroness Orczy, Alexandre Dumas, H.G. Wells, William Harrison Ainsworth, and Harriet Beecher Stowe.  Other authors whose novels had dustjackets signed “Abbey” included H.C. Bailey, John Bude, John Dickson Carr, Leslie Charteris, William Le Queux, John Rhode, Sax Rohmer, Dorothy L. Sayers, Hugh Walpole, J.S. Fletcher, Joseph Hocking and E. Phillips Oppenheim. Amongst the publishers of these were Ward, Lock & Co., Hodder & Stoughton, John Murray, Hurst & Blackett, Methuen & Co., Hamish Hamilton, J.M. Dent & Sons, Skeffington & Son, T. Fisher Unwin, Collins, Constable & Co., Rupert Hale and Herbert Jenkins.  (In particular, for Herbert Jenkins he did dustjackets for several of P.G. Wodehouse’s books, including Hot Water (1932), Mulliner Nights (1933), Thank You, Jeeves (1934), Right Ho Jeeves (1934), The Luck of the Bodkins (1935), Laughing Gas (1936), and Lord Emsworth and Others (1937)). All of these dustjackets carry the “Abbey” signature, albeit with stylistic differences.

The name of “Abbey” also appeared on the cover of the Christmas edition of the Radio Times in 1924 and 1925. It also appeared on the dustwrapper of the second “Tom Merry” annual in 1950, although the internal illustrations were all signed “J. Abbey.”

Salomon also used the name of “C. Morse” on a number of dustjackets (and in at least two books). David Cuppleditch suggested that this was at the behest of Edmund Blampied, who was acting as his agent, and worried that Salomon was getting too much work. Other sources suggest that the use of “Morse” was to avoid problems between different publishers. (This point was also made by J.H. Pender in The Print Collector’s Quarterly in 1939). This seems a little odd, as most of the surviving “Morse” dustjackets date from the 1920s, at the outset of Salomon’s career. These were books published by, amongst others, Collins, T. Fisher Unwin, Gerald Duckworth, E. Nash & Grayson, Herbert Jenkins, Cassell & Co., William Heinemann, Stanley Paul and Hutchinson & Co. Authors included Anthony Berkeley, Agatha Christie, William Le Queux, Archibald Marshall, Herbert Jenkins (in particular the portrayal of his cockney character “Bindle”), Freeman Wills Croft, Eden Phillpotts, Raphael Sabatini and Dorothy L. Sayers. (The name of “C. Morse” came from a distant cousin who was living in America).

As an illustrator, Salomon was helped by a large collection of reference books, on every conceivable subject. In a later article in The Artist (January 1950) he explained his particular fondness for historical fiction: “In costume novels there is a chance for more colourful characters than those of the more prosaic modern day...”

One his last commissions was from Associated British Pathe in 1953, which asked for a watercolour painting of the Coronation.

Throughout his career Salomon lived at a variety of addresses. In the late 1920s and early 1930s he lived at 19 Thornton Avenue, Streatham Hill; at the time of the 1939 Register he was living at “Fair Oaks,” Town Hill, Godstone, Surrey; in 1945 he was living at 15 Beechwood Hall, Regent’s Park Road, Finchley; and by 1948 he had moved back to 19 Thornton Avenue, Streatham Hill. After spending a year or so in South Africa and New Zealand (1951-52) he returned to Streatham Hill, but shortly afterwards loved to 42 Colebrook Close, West Hill, Putney.

David Cuppleditch wrote that Salomon Van Abbe was “grossly overweight and suffered from angina.” He died at 42 Colebrook Close on 28 February 1955, leaving an estate valued at £4,066 (around £100,000 in today’s terms), with probate granted to his widow Hannah and his son Norman. Hannah died, at 67A Manor Road, North Hinchley Wood, Esher, Surrey, on 12 November 1973.

PUBLICATIONS

Books Illustrated by Salomon Van Abbe
The Queen’s Gift Book, Hodder & Stoughton, 1915 (with other artists)
The Piper of Pax by E.K.Wade, 1924
Pam and the Fearless Fourth by Betty Laws, Cassell & Co. 1927 (as C. Morse)
Betty of the Rectory by L.T. Meade, Cassell & Co., 1928 (re-issue) (as C. Morse)
Loyalties: A Drama in Three Acts by John Galsworthy, Duckworth, 1930
The Golden Three by William Le Queux, Ward, Lock & Co., 1930 (as C. Morse)
The Great and the Goods by Ivor Brown, Hamish Hamilton, 1937
At the Circus: A Picture Book, Raphael Tuck & Sons, 1937
With the Commandos by Percy F. Westerman, Blackie & Son, 1943
Combined Operations by Percy F. Westerman, Blackie & Son, 1944
The Secret of Storm Abbey by Ann Castleton, Hollis & Carter, 1946
The Forsyths of Ferncroft by Winifred Norling, Hollis & Carter, 1946
The Secret Fortress by J. Reason, J.M. Dent & Sons, 1946
My Lord Mayor and the City of London by William Kent, Herbert Jenkins, 1947
The Two Giants by Brian Battershaw, Hollis & Carter, 1947
The Children’s Own Wonder Book, Odhams Press, 1947 (with other artists)
The Wonder Gift Book for Children, Odhams Press, 1947 (with other artists)
Sergeant the Dog by Joan Begbie, Hollis & Carter, 1948
Smugglers on the Saltings by Douglas V. Duff, Hollis & Carter, 1948
Treasure Island by Robert Louis Stevenson, J.M. Dent & Sons, 1948 (re-issue)
Little Women by Louisa May Alcott, J.M. Dent & Sons, 1948 (re-issue)
That Holiday at School by Ann Castleton, Hollis & Carter, 1949
Robin Hood, The Prince of Outlaws by Carola Oman, J.M. Dent & Sons, 1949
Adventure Abroad by Mary Kennedy, George Newnes Ltd., 1949
Tom Brown’ Schooldays by Thomas Hughes, J.M. Dent & Sons, 1949 (re-issue)
A Wonder Book by Nathaniel Hawthorne, J.M. Dent & Sons, 1949 (re-issue)
Jennings Goes to School by Anthony Buckeridge, Collins, 1950
The Bowmen of Rye by Lesley Morley, Macdonald, 1950
Tanglewood Tales by Nathaniel Hawthrone, J.M. Dent & Sons, 1950 (re-issue)
Jennings Follows a Clue by Anthony Buckeridge, Collins, 1951
At the Villa Rose by A.E.W. Mason, University of London Press, 1951
Jennings and Darbishire by Anthony Buckeridge, Collins, 1952
Jennings’ Diary by Anthony Buckeridge, Collins, 1953
God Save the Queen, Raphael Tuck & Sons, 1953
Good Wives by Louisa May Alcott, J.M. Dent & Sons, 1953 (re-issue)
According to Jennings by Anthony Buckeridge, Collins, 1954
The Mad Miller of Wareham by Joyce Reason, J.M. Dent & Sons, 1954
The Pilgrim’s Progress, Specially Rewritten for Children by Laurence S.G. Morris, Ward, Lock & Co., 1954 (re-issue)
Lazy Jack, and Other Stories by D.B. Charlton, Blackie & Son, 1955
The Story of Man, Part I: The World of Long Ago by J.B. Neilson, Longmans, Green & Co., 1955
The Heroes by Charles Kingsley, Blackie & Son, 1955 (re-issue)
Robin Hood and His Merry Men by Margaret Wall, Raphael Tuck & Sons, (?)

Books Illustrated as C. Morse
A Yorkshire Suburb by William Riley, Herbert Jenkins, 1920
Pam and the Fearles Fourth by Betty Laws, Cassell & Co., 1927
Betty of the Rectory by L.T. Meade, Cassell 7 Co., 1928 (re-issue)
The Golden Three by William Le Queux, Ward, Lock & Co., 1930