Coastal scene, Frederick R. Childs (monastery collection)

The inspirational little book titled Jesus Calling by Sarah Young recently gave the day’s admonishment: “Stop trying to work things out before their times have come. Accept the limitations of living one day at a time.” While this reminder is ever timely, the work of some days includes looking ahead. And although it is still nine months in the future and its time has not yet come, the year 2026 has been looming large on our radar screen for a number of good reasons.

2026 will mark the 100th anniversary celebration of Portsmouth Abbey School, known originally as Portsmouth Priory School. Many of the men of the Class of ’76 will convene for their 50th anniversary reunion as our school’s hundredth year begins. We have noted that several of them have taken on the project of restoring the Zen Garden adjacent to the church, which had been a convenient if surreptitious gathering spot for some during their halcyon schoolboy days. They have assisted in some of the garden’s necessary alterations during the recent construction of the new monastery elevator tower. Overshadowing these more local and regional milestones will be the 250th anniversary of the American Revolution, 1776-2026, and a harbinger of mortality for those of us who remember the Bicentennial festivities of 1976, which led two years later to a reenactment of the Battle of Rhode Island here on the monastery grounds. Landmark dates for the School often connect to those of the monastic community as well. And here a more somber anniversary led me to consider an artist connected with our Abbey. The fiftieth anniversary of the untimely death in 1976 of one of our community, Fr. Luke Childs, will also be noted by many in 2026. This confirmed a decision to continue The Current’s series on “Artists of the Abbey” with an article about his father, artist Frederick Robbins Childs. The two form firm links in an extended chain of relations that cross generations of the monastery and school, woven into the tapestry of art, culture, academia and monastic life of Portsmouth Abbey.
Fr. Luke Childs, O.S.B.Frederick Robbins Childs (1908-1978) and his wife, Mary Alexandra “Sandra” Hitchcock Childs (1909-2004), sent their four sons to Portsmouth for their schooling: Nicholas H. ’52, Daniel R. ’53, Alexander C. ’57, and Jeffrey S. ’65. The Childs lived in New York City’s Upper East Side neighborhood of Carnegie Hill and in Noroton, Connecticut. Frederick Childs’ family had long been established New Yorkers. His son Alexander’s middle initial “C”, as a prime example, derives from the maiden name of Frederick’s mother – Crimmins. Constance Crimmins was the daughter of John D. Crimmins (1844-1917), a well-known New York figure who, according to the Smithsonian website, was deeply involved in civic, social, and philanthropic activities. Noting his service as New York City Park Commissioner, Presidential elector, and as a member of the New York State Constitutional Convention, Smithsonian notes: “A Roman Catholic, Mr. Crimmins worked for the church in a variety of roles, from university trustee to waiter at a Christmas dinner for the poor.” He was also noted as a contributor to the construction of St. Patrick’s Cathedral and (like William V. Griffin commemorated in Our Lady’s Chapel here at Portsmouth) was made a Knight Commander of the Order of St. Gregory the Great. Frederick’s father, also Frederick Robbins Childs, was the son of Harris Childs of Great Neck, New York, and graduated from Harvard in 1900, part of the long Childs line at Harvard. He had worked as a broker at Rowland Knapp & Co. in New York City leading up to his marriage to Constance in April of 1907. But tragically, in October of 1907, just months after marrying Constance, he would succumb to typhoid fever, at the age of 28. Constance would, from 1907 until her death in 1973, be known as Mrs. Frederick R. Childs, with her son Frederick born in January of 1908.
Frederick R. Childs (monastery collection)Frederick Childs graduated from Harvard in 1930, thirty years after his father – and thirty-one years before his son Alexander, our Fr. Luke Childs. He had studied journalism, taking work first as a reporter for The New York World. Something or someone convinced him to try the road not first taken, and that road led to Paris, France. It was while studying painting in Paris in the studio of André L'Hote that he met his future wife, Sandra Hitchcock, marrying in 1933. L'Hote was a French Cubist painter and it is said by some that his influence is evident in Childs’ later paintings, in particular in the bright palettes and Cubist angles of his portraits and landscapes. An undated and untitled still life painting in the Abbey Collection reflects, if not the bright colors, the angles seen in the white tablecloth which anchors the objects, especially the birdhouse and what appear to be spikey bird-of-paradise flowers. One of his paintings in the Abbey Collection is identified as a scene in neighboring Tiverton, Rhode Island. Another is an untitled coastal study with the horizon line neatly bisecting the canvas horizontally, the cloud-dappled teal and robin’s-egg blue sky reflected in the channel and rivulets below. One might imagine the doting dad, Frederick Childs, New York post-Impressionist artist and father of the four boys, taking regular train rides or auto drives back-and-forth along the coast to and from our Cory’s Lane campus over a span of about 17 years. One can picture this artist packing his paints and palette, brushes and canvases and a portable easel for his plein-air pursuits around Aquidneck Island. It seems that the area provided not only a spot for a solid education for his children, but ample natural beauty to inspire his artwork. As was the case with many in his generation, World War II had interrupted his career and his other pursuits. Childs served with the United States infantry in Europe, as well as with the American Field Service in North Africa. But after the war’s end, he continued his painting and enjoyed several one‐man shows at the Passedoit Gallery in Manhattan. His work continues to appear on auction sites where his style has also been compared to that of Fernand Léger and Georges Braque, French contemporaries of L'Hote.
Image from 1977 Portsmouth Bulletin, with caption reading: "Shortly before his retirement after sixteen years of dedicated service as Headmaster, Dom Leo van Winkle appears with Daniel R. Childs '53, Chairman of the Board of Consultants, and John M. Hogan '54, President of the Alumni Association 1972-1976."Moving to the next generation, it was Frederick’s son Alexander who supplied the monastic thread when, after graduating Harvard magna cum laude in 1961, he immediately entered the community at Portsmouth where he took the religious name of Brother Luke, O.S.B., and was ordained a priest in 1968. He died tragically young in 1976 at the age of 36 after suffering a brain aneurysm. We remembered him fondly in the July 2020 issue of The Current. As I had reported then, while rearranging items in storage in the monastery, I discovered a pair of his black socks now extant in the Abbey Archives, identified by the stitched-in boarding-school-style nametapes reading, ALEXANDER C. CHILDS. His brother, Daniel R. Childs of the class of 1953, continued the Childs family’s ongoing involvement at Portsmouth in a different way, with his sons Frederick ’75 and Hilary ’86, and granddaughter Elizabeth Childs ’08 all attending the School, and as well as by serving on our School’s board. That family connection widens to include the children of Frederick R. Childs’ daughter Florence – Alexandra ’02, Margaret ’06, and Ian Macdonald ’08. We can also note, to further extend this Portsmouth web of relations – though this points to material worthy of many, many more articles – Daniel had married Margaret Burden, daughter of Shirley Carter Burden and sister of another Portsmouth alum, Carter Burden ’59, all remarkable New Yorkers well-known for a wide range of involvements, from politics to journalism to art and culture. Shirley Carter Burden, as the memorial plaque on our principal classroom building notes, donated that building in 1980 in memory of his wife, Flobelle Fairbanks Burden, “to mark her great devotion to this school and monastery.”

We thus can situate our artist, Frederick R. Childs, as firmly connected to that line of “great devotion.” Frederick Robbins Childs died in 1978 at the age of 70 in Stamford, Connecticut, two years after his son, Dom Luke Childs, O.S.B., monk of Portsmouth.

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Brother Sixtus Roslevich, O.S.B. and Blake Billings, Ph.D. have been collaborating on The Current for several years now, and worked together to produce this article of Frederick Robbins.