In my earlier essay on ‘Christ Church Streatham and the Rise of Constructional Polychromy’, I noted that ‘sometime between May and September 1842 [James] Wild departed for Cairo, together with Joseph Bonomi, as part of Richard Lepsius's expedition. There he remained over five years ….’ These dates I concluded from receipts paid to him for work at Streatham and now held in the London Metropolitan Archives and from information contained in Mark Crinson's book Empire Building, Ornamentalism and Victorian Architecture.

Since writing this, Professor Michael Port has kindly brought to my attention documents which he discovered in the Hampstead Parish Church Archives which throw some further light on Wild's movements. It would seem that his time in Egypt was not as lengthy or as continuous as I had thought.

In February 1842 the Revd Thomas Ainger, vicar of St John's Church, Hampstead, had promoted an architectural competition for the enlargement of the church to provide additional accommodation for the poor of what was a rapidly increasing parish. In March, entries were received from Robert Hesketh, William Lovell, W. J. Donthorne and Louis Vulliamy, but the winning design came from James Wild. This would have suited Wild well, for his work at Streatham was now pretty well finished, the church having been consecrated the previous November.