portrait of the Princess Sophia of Gloucester as Psyche plucking the golden wool model exhibited 1781 Love seizing the human soul in the form of a butterfly The last was brought home by the artist unfinished and is probably the marble statue of Cupid which was exhibited in 1781 In this year finding little encouragement in England he went to Russia taking this figure with him which was bought for 380l. by the Empress Catherine who gave him the Armed Neutrality as a subject to be done into stone He is said to have executed this and other works at St Petersburg but either because the climate did not agree with him or from discontent at his prospects in Russia he returned to London in 1782 when he met with considerable encouragement From 1780 to 1803 his name is absent three times only from the catalogues of the Royal Academy—in 1786, 1790 and 1801 In 1784 appeared (in plaster) his grand figure of Achilles enraged for the Loss of Briseis which was afterwards presented by his widow to the British Institution where it stood in the vestibule till the alteration of the gallery in 1868. It is now (1885) in the entrance hall of the Royal Academy at Burlington House. In this year (1784) he was elected an associate and the year afterwards a full member of the Royal Academy As his diploma work he presented his finely conceived figure of the 'Failing Titan.' This work is sufficient to show that Banks was gifted with unusual imagination of a poetic kind but there was little encouragement in England for works of this order and though he continued to model them for his own pleasure his commissions till the end of his life were confined to busts and monuments Colonel Johnes, of Hafod in Cardiganshire, did indeed engage him to execute the 'Achilles enraged' in marble but this friend and patron changed his mind in favour of 'Thetis dipping Achilles' with Mrs Johnes as Thetis and Miss Johnes as the infant hero Many of Banks's works were burnt at a fire at Hafod In Westminster Abbey there are monuments by Banks to Dr Watts Woollett the engraver and Sir Eyre Coote. The last is celebrated for its life size figure of a Mahratta captive which was exhibited in 1789 In St Paul's are his monuments to Captains Hutt, Westcott and Rundle Burgess. His figure of Shakespeare which long adorned the front of Boydell's Shakespeare Gallery afterwards the British Institution in Pall Mall has been removed to Stratford. Other important works of his are the monument to Mrs Petrie in Lewisham Church, the model for which called 'Pity weeping at the Tomb of Benevolence,' was exhibited in 1788; and another to Penelope Boothby in Ashbourne Church, Derbyshire. The latter represents the sleeping figure of a child of six, and the queen and her daughters are said to have burst into tears on seeing it at Somerset House in 1793. Banks was also the author of the statue of Lord Cornwallis at Madras, of General Coutts (executed for the India House) and of the monuments to Mr. Hand in Cripplegate Church and to Baretti in St Marylebone Old Church. Amongst his busts may be mentioned Horne Tooke, Warren Hastings (now in the National Portrait Gallery) Mrs Cosway and Mrs Siddons as Melpomene. His last exhibited work 1803 was a bust of Oliver Cromwell. At the International Exhibition in 1862 besides the 'Falling Titan,' 'Achilles enraged' and 'Thetis rising to console Achilles,' there was a work called 'Achilles putting on Helmet,' belonging to Mr E. H. Corbould. At his death his studio was full of sketches of poetical subjects chiefly Homeric many of which are praised by Allan Cunningham..
Few incidents are recorded in the life of Banks. He was the friend of Hoppner, Flaxman, Fuseli, and Horne Tooke, and was arrested on the charge of high treason about the same time as Tooke and Hardy. It is said that his practice suffered from suspicion of his revolutionary tendencies. He was noted for his kindness to young artists and was of special service to young Mulready. Banks is represented as tall erect silent and dignified with a winning address and persuasive manners. He was religious and strict in his manners frugal of habit, but liberal to others. He made a fine collection of engravings and drawings by the old masters, which, after his death came into the possession of his daughter Mrs Forster and have since been divided between E.J. Poynter R.A., and Mrs Lee Childe. He died on 2 Feb 1805, and was buried in Paddington churchyard. Flaxman delivered an address to the students of the Royal Academy on the occasion of his death and there is a plain tablet to his memory in the north aisle of Westminster Abbey.
[Cunningham's Lives; Nollekens and his Times; Flaxman's Lectures; Redgrave's Dict.; Gent. Mag. lxxvi 816, 924, and lxxxi (pt. ii.) 617; Royal Academy Catalogues; Fagan's Collectors' Marks; Cat. of International Exhibition, 1862.]
BANKS, THOMAS CHRISTOPHER (1765–1854), genealogist, claimed by his father connection with the family of Banks of Whitley in Yorkshire whose descent he traced from Richard Bankes [q. v.], a baron of the exchequer in the time of Henry IV and
