The last will and testament of Theodor Kern’s widow, Frieda, dated 1st May 1975, includes a list of artistic works by her late husband, to be distributed among family and friends. Item 24 on the list bequeaths ‘two wooden carved Kings from Crib set’, located ‘one on bookshelf in Living Room and one on staircase’, to ‘the sons of Mrs. Jean Watts’.
Jean Watts was an amateur painter and a member of Hitchin Art Club. She wrote the definitive history of the art club, which I’ve found extremely helpful in understanding Theodor Kern’s involvement in the group, and it’s also a wonderful source of photographs of Kern in later life (see this post). Mrs. Watts also wrote at least one magazine article about Kern’s life and work, published in Hertfordshire Countryside in 1967 (see this post.)
Gerard Watts, one of Jean Watts’ sons, has contacted me and has kindly shared with me some photographs of two wooden carvings by Theodor Kern in his possession. One of them is certainly one of the ‘two wooden carved Kings’ itemised in Frieda Kern’s will. As I’ve noted in previous posts, the story of the Anbetung or adoration of the Three Kings was a scene that Kern often depicted in his paintings. I wonder what happened to the other figures from the crib set?
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Another photograph sent to me by Gerard Watts is of a wooden carving of the head of a young girl. I wonder if this is the ‘carved wooden head of a young girl’, said to be located ‘on staircase’, which Frieda Kern originally left to the ‘officers of Hitchin Art Club, Lavender Barn, Lucas Lane, Hitchin’?
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Gerard Watts tells the story of visiting Theodor Kern at his home in Bearton Green, Hitchin, when he was a boy, probably on an errand for his mother, ‘and he, knowing of my attempts at carving, gave me a mallet…home made!..which I still have and is in my tool box.’ Gerard included a photograph of the mallet in his email to me:
In a codicil to her will, Frieda Kern declares, among other revisions, that ‘whereas in Item 24 of the Schedule to my said will I have given two wooden carved figures to the sons of Mrs Jean Watts now I give in addition to them a small water colour of The White Cliffs of Dover and a small water colour of a harbour in Wales with the intent that of her three sons one should receive the two paintings and each of the others receive one of the wooden statues as they may arrange among themselves.’ (After the word ‘Wales’, Frieda has added the handwritten and initialled note ‘hanging in Bathroom’.)
Gerard Watts tells me that he also has some paintings by Kern in his possession, and he promises to send me photographs of these in due course. However, since he describes these as religious paintings, it seems they are unlikely to be the two pictures referred to in Frieda’s will.
I asked Gerard about the brief biography of Kern which his mother is said to have written, but which so far I’ve had no luck in tracking down. He says he has no knowledge of the book but has promised to ask his brother Kevin about it. Sadly, Simon, the youngest Watts brother, passed away a few years ago.
The Watts family were obviously close friends of Theodor and Frieda Kern. In addition to Jean’s involvement in the art club, they were also fellow parishioners at the church of Our Lady Immaculate and St. Andrew, where Mr. Watts helped to run the Scout troop. Father Andrew O’Dell, the former parish priest, now retired, who has been so helpful to me in my own research on Kern, was and still is a close friend of the Watts family.
Theodor Kern 