John Chessel Buckler (1793-1894) was born in Oxfordshire, eldest son of the architect and architectural draughtsman John Buckler FSA (1770-1851) and Ann Chessell. He was an artist who painstakingly reproduced buildings with a particular interest in churches and other monuments, he produced many fine watercolor drawings of country houses and churches. His drawings are known to be accurate depictions of how buildings were at a certain time and hence prove useful for historians. He acquired his aptitude for drawing most likely from his father and he took drawing lessons with Francis Nicholson as well as his architectural training in draughtsmanship. Magdalen College School in Oxford was built to his design in 1850. He exhibited at the Royal Academy and retired to Melbury House, Cowley, Oxford, where he died at the ripe old age of 100 on the 5th January 1894.
In The Builder, Volume 10 Dec 1852 page 7 John Buckler noted: “to build, repair, or survey warehouses and sash-windowed dwellings, however profitable, was so much less to my taste than perspective drawing with such subjects before me as cathedrals, abbeys and ancient parish churches, that I never made any effort to increase the number of my employments as an architect.”
J C Buckler appears to have visited Layston twice in 1831 and then again in 1832.
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