Nash, Thomas

‘The Royal Bed’, Holborn Bridge, London; upholsterer, appraiser furniture retailer (1714–d. 1748)

Purchased a Sun Insurance policy on 16 July 1714 on goods and merchandise in his house [London Metropolitan Archive, Sun MS vol. 4, ref. 4186; vol. 10, 11 August 1719; vol. 10, ref. 4843; vol. 16, ref. 31730].

Advertised in November 1722 that he had a stock of calico quilts and pointed out that these would not be available so readily after Christmas when a new Act of Parliament would impose £20 fines to protect the British textile industries [The Post Boy, 15 November 1722].

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Trade card of Tho.^s Nash, Elking.ⁿ Hall, Rich.^d Whitehorne, At the Royal Bed on Holborn Bridge London. Make & Sell Fashionable Silk & Stuff Beds, with all other sorts of Upholsterers Goods, And large Sconces, Pier & Chimney Glasses, Dressing glasses, Chest of Draws, Buroes, Desk & Book cases, Mahogany tables, Card tables, Chairs & Settees, and all other Sorts of Cabinet Work at Reasonable Rates. N.B. All Sorts of Goods Appraised, c. 1728 [D,2.615]. © The Trustees of the British Museum

In partnership with John Hill by April 1724 and although the Holborn Bridge premises continued to be the base of operations goods and merchandise were also kept at a new house at ‘The Golden Ball’, New Buildings, Fleet Ditch. Later the business traded as a partnership between Thomas Nash, Elkington Hall and Richard Whitehorne and they issued an elaborate trade card showing as fine state bed in a fashionable interior.

Thomas Nash was clearly a person of some status and in March 1733 was nominated for Governor of St Bartholomew's Hospital. At the time of his death on 23 October 1748 he was described as an ‘eminent upholsterer’ and a Common Councillor for the ward of Farringdon Without; ‘a person of good Character and esteem'd by all his Acquaintances’ [London Evening Post, 22–25 October 1748]. At this point only one of the partners was still active in the business, and on 3 March 1749, due to pressure by the executors, part of the stock was sold off by auction [Daily Advertiser, 11 February 1749; London Evening Post, 3 March 1749].

Few of Nash's patrons are known, but one of them was Joseph Banks jnr who wrote to Joseph Banks of Revesby, Lincolnshire on 9 May 1716 complaining that ‘upon examining the bed Mr. Nash of Fleet Ditch has sent me I find it the most scurvy thing that ever was imposed on any body’ [St Bartholomew's Hospital archives; Hill, Letters … of the Banks Family…, p. 21].

Richard Hoare who supported ‘Nash & Son’ in May 1740 was probably more satisfied with the two mahogany bookcases and other work carried out for which £19 4s 6d was charged. He made a payment to Nash on 13 November 1741 of £17 16s 6d which was probably for other work [Hoare's Bank archives].

Source: DEFM