Launt Thompson, Sculptor

(b. 1833, d. 1894)

Sculptor

From A Dictionary of Irish Artists 1913

Was born at Abbeyleix, Queen's County, on 8th February, 1833. In 1847 hw went with his widowed mother, to America and settled at Albany, New York. Intending to enter the medical profession his study of anatomy led him to practice drawing and he became a pupil of the sculptor Erastus D. Palmer, with whom he remained for nine years. In 1878 he opened a studio of his own in New York, and acquired a reputation by his medallion heads and portrait busts, and finally by his statues. He visited Rome in 1868, and from 1875 to 1887 resided in Florence, when he returned to America. He executed a number of important public statues, among them being "Abraham Pierson, first President of Yale College"; "John Sedgwick," erected at West Point; "Winfield Scott," in the Soldier's Home, Washington; "Ambrose E. Burnside," at Providence, Pennsylvania. He died at Middletown, New York, on 27th September, 1894.

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