Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 38.djvu/381

Moore of defence in that fortress skilfully drawn by Moore. [Despatches; War Office Records; Royal Engineers' Records; Beatson's Naval and Military Memoirs, 1804, vol. i.; Cust's Annals of the Wars of the Eighteenth Century, 1860.]

 MOORE, JOSEPH (1766–1851), Birmingham benefactor, born in 1766 at Shelsley-Beauchamp or Shelsley-Walsh, Worcestershire, was educated at Worcester. In 1781 he was sent to Birmingham to learn die-sinking, and afterwards entered into a partnership in the button trade. Acquiring an independent position he devoted his leisure to works of charity. In conjunction with Thomas Hawkes and others he founded a dispensary for the sick poor. He came to know Matthew Boulton [q. v.], of the Soho works, who introduced him to James Watt. At Boulton's instigation Moore formed a society for the performance of private concerts, the first of which took place in 1799 at Dee's Hotel. This society existed for several years, and developed a taste for high-class music. The festival committee now sought Moore's aid, and he planned the festival of 1799. From 1802 he virtually took the chief direction of the festivals, the profits of which went to support the General Hospital. In recognition of his services to the hospital he was presented, on 6 April 1812, with a service of plate (, Modern Birmingham, i. 394), and his portrait by Wyatt was also purchased for the hospital.

In 1808 Moore established the Birmingham Oratorio Choral Society, with the view of bringing together for practice the local singers engaged at the triennial festivals (ib. ii. 124). In order to provide the town with a building sufficiently large to do justice to the festivals, Moore successfully agitated for the erection of the town-hall (1832-4). A public subscription was raised to pay for the organ. At the festival of 1834 both hall and organ were used for the first time. To enhance the fame of the festivals Moore went to Berlin, and induced Mendelssohn to compose, first, 'St. Paul,' which was given at the festival of 1837, and then 'Elijah' performed in 1846. The net profits arising from the festivals while under Moore's management (1802-49) amounted to 51,756l.

Moore died at his house, Crescent, Birmingham, on 19 April 1851, and was buried in the church of England cemetery there. A monument was erected to his memory by subscription.

[The Birmingham General Hospital and the Triennial Festivals, by J. Thackray Bunce, pp. 106-9, 2nd edit. pp. 77, 91-4; Times cited in Gent. Mag. 1851, pt. i. pp. 670-1; Langford's Century of Birmingham Life, ii. 321; Dent's Old and New Birmingham, sect. iii. p. 437; Mendelssohn's Letters to Moscheles, 1888, p. 268.]

 MOORE, JOSEPH (1817–1892), medallist and die-sinker, born at Eastbourne, Sussex, in 1817, was the son of Edwin Moore, a builder of hothouses, who temporarily left his business during the Peninsular war and in a fit of enthusiasm joined the 10th hussars, with which he saw active service. A few weeks after Joseph Moore's birth his parents removed to Birmingham, where he continued to live all his life. He showed an early aptitude for drawing, and was apprenticed to Thomas Halliday, die-sinker, of Newhall Street, Birmingham. He also attended the drawing classes of Samuel Lines of Temple Row, Birmingham. For many years Moore was engaged in the production of dies for commercial uses, chiefly for buttons. In 1844 he entered into partnership with John Allen, a fellow-apprentice. The partners carried on business as Allen & Moore in Great Hampton Row, Birmingham, and manufactured articles of papier-mâché, and also metal vases, cups, and boxes. These metal wares, produced by machines invented by Allen, were 'engine-cut on bodies coated with colour, and portions being cut away by the lathe, the patterns, chiefly designed by Moore, were left in colour in low relief.' Partly owing to changes of fashion the works had to be closed, and Moore, after having lost all he had, began business for himself in 1856 as a die-sinker, first in Summer Lane and afterwards, and till his death, in Pitsford Street, Birmingham.

Moore's first medal, produced in 1846, was a large piece, nearly four inches in diameter, bearing the 'Salvator Mundi' of Da Vinci as the obverse, and the 'Christus Consolator' of Ary Scheffer as the reverse. Only a few copies of this medal, which was highly praised by Scheffer, were produced. From this time Moore had a large number of commissions for die-sinking and designing, and executed numerous prize and commemorative medals. Many of these, made for English and colonial trading firms, do not bear Moore's name. He employed his son and other assistants in his business, but the best of his works were cut by his own hand. A selection of his medals was presented by Moore to the Corporation Art Gallery of Birmingham.

Moore was an honourable and kind-hearted man, fond of music and art, and intensely devoted to his work. He was the first president of the Midland Art Club. In March