Bust of Robert E. Lee
Bronze
23 x 16 3/4 x 11 1/4 in
Biography
Edwin E. Codman, son of William Christmas Codman (1839 – 1923) and his wife, Emma Rolle, was born in London on December 19, 1876. In 1888 Edwin’s brother William was hired by The Gorham Foundry, in Rhode Island. Their father, also named William, became Director of Design at Gorham, in November 1891. Edwin followed in both his father and brother’s footsteps to Rhode Island.
The teenage Edwin was trained as a modeler and sculptor in the Gorham Apprentice Program. In 1898, the Providence City Directory notes that he “removed to Paris” to study sculpture, and by 1899, he had returned and joined the Providence Art Club.
With his second brother, Frank, Edwin established a silver manufacturing shop called Codman & Codman in 1902, they made pieces very much in the Martelé style, which their father (with whom all three sons lived all these years) designed for Gorham. When Codman & Codman failed in 1905, Gorham bought its assets and Edwin traveled to Europe with his parents.
He married Janet Mather, daughter of William Penn Mather, a wealthy textile manufacturer, in September 1906. Edwin remained an artist member of the Providence Art Club. During his early married days, he and his wife lived near the Gorham factory, where he remained as a modeler. He worked on silver projects and made small bronze sculptures for the Company, as well as having the Company cast pieces of his own. He left Gorham (again) in June 1914, two weeks after his father’s retirement and returned to England.
When his father-in-law died on July 7, 1925, the death was front-page news in the Providence Journal, the childless couple must have come into a significant bequest. They moved to the more fashionable East Side of Providence. Around 1929 – 1931, they moved to Dorset, Vermont and lived as recluses. There is no evidence that Edwin did any sculptural work in Vermont.
He took his own life at the age of 79 on April 29, 1955. Edwin had neither children nor close relatives, only his wife and maid.
