November 7th Sylanus Trevail (Death)
     

 

 

 

 

Luxulyan – born Silvanus Trevail (1851 – 1903) was the most important Cornish architect of the 19th century who rose to prominence, locally, becoming Mayor of Truro, and, nationally, as President of the Society of Architects.

A campaigner for education and for sanitation, Trevail designed over fifty Board Schools subsequent to the Forster Education Act (1870).  His skills were, however, distributed more widely as demonstrated by his design of the Headland Hotel in Newquay (above right) and the Carbis Bay Hotel (below right). He also designed the Housel Bay Hotel where Marconi (December 12th) resided whilst working at Poldhu.

Trevail’s interests also extended to ecclesiastical history and he funded the rebuilding of the derelict Church at Temple in 1883. Temple is a fascinating church for two reasons; it was built by the Knights Templar (c. 1120) as a chapel of ease for pilgrims travelling ‘The Saints Way’ to Jerusalem but it was also a Church where marriages could be performed, with neither banns needing to be read nor a licence being required. 

Tragically, suffering from lifelong depression, he shot himself in a train’s lavatory near Bodmin Road.

 

 


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