Sculptor and mason, originally from Bury St Edmunds. He married in Norwich in 1707 and became a freeman of the city in 1716. He ran a successful practice in premises adjacent to Norwich Cathedral. Singleton’s work includes monuments to: Colonel Edmund Soame (d. 1706) in St Andrew, West Dereham, Norfolk, praised by Rupert Gunnis as ‘an exciting and remarkable work’; Sir Dudley Cullum (d. 1720) in All Saints, Hawstead, Suffolk; and, in Norwich, Alderman Richard Manby (d. 1720) in St Martin at Palace Plain; Mary Bateman (d. 1721) in St Gregory; and Thomas Pindar (d. 1722) in St George Colegate. In c.1729 Singleton entered into partnership with George Bottomley; following the dissolution of the partnership in 1737, the two men’s stock-in-trade was acquired by Robert Page. Two of Singleton and Bottomley’s signed works are in Norwich, that to Thomas Batcheler (d. 1729) in the cathedral and to Daniel Fromanteel (d. 1734) in St Gregory Pottergate.
Bibliography: R. Cocke, Public Sculpture of Norfolk and Suffolk, Liverpool, 2013, pp. xviii, 265–66; R. Gunnis, Dictionary of British Sculptors 1660–1850, London, [1968], p. 353; I. Roscoe et al, A Biographical Dictionary of Sculptors in Britain 1660–1851, New Haven and London, 2009, pp. 1132–33.
Richard Cocke, 2013; revised, Terry Cavanagh, May 2025
