After attending junior school for a year or two, Gray and his brother moved to the Chelsea Grammar School. Because so many artists lived in Chelsea it was natural that many sent their sons to this school and it was there that he met the brothers Hughes. Their father was a painter of still life – mostly fruit – and was known at the Savage Club as ‘Fruity Hughes.’ There were three boys, William, Herbert and Sydney. William became a painter and an expert on old costume, and the collection which he formed is now in the Victorian and Albert Museum. Herbert changed his name to Hughes Stanton when he began to exhibit because so many other painters were named Hughes. He became an RA and President of the Royal Society of Painters in Water Colour and received a knighthood.
The more Gray became acquainted with artists and studios the more he wanted to become a painter. But his Father refused to countenance this and he went to work in the family business at the age of thirteen. His Father had a stroke and his eldest son Alfred took over running the business. His Father died two years later.
‘In about 1885 I became acquainted with Jacomb-Hood, whose studio was in Manresa Road. He proved to be a good friend and helped me in my efforts to become an artist. Through him I got to know other painters in the nearby studios.’
It was in one of these studio visits that he met Fred Brown, who was then headmaster of the Westminster School of Art. Gray asked him about his evening classes and he invited Gray to join. There he met lifelong friends such as Fred Pegram, the future Sir William Russell, Henry Tonks and Aubrey Beardsley.
Gray was given an ultimatum by his Brother to give up art or leave the business and he chose to leave. Now he had to start earning a living and Pegram came to his rescue and got him commissions to draw for the many new daily and weekly newspapers and magazines. He regularly attended dress rehearsals at London theatres and met play writers and actors and actresses at the peak of their fame such as Oscar Wilde, Lily Langtrey and Beerbohm Tree.
1886 - 1890 Working as an artist
His friend Fred Pegram found several commissions for Gray from Alfred Harmsworth’s publications Home Chat and The Sunday Companion. He was commissioned by Charles Morley, Editor, to make drawings of Lily Langtry for the Pall Mall Gazette. He also joined his friends Pegram, Russell and Tonks for long painting weekends at Marlow on the River Thames
1890 - 1892 Studying in Paris and travelling to Palestine
Four artist friends and Gray and his brother Alfred, who was recovering from serious illness, travelled to Paris to attend the Academic Julian. There they studied under lecturers Gabriel Ferrier and Francois Flameng. They had digs just off the Rue Lepic which ran up the hill behind the Moulin Rouge and which at that time was at the height of its popularity. The classes finished at noon and in the afternoons Gray and his brother explored Paris. They attended the Opera Ball having been given tickets by the Director of the Opera who was a friend of Georgina Weldon. Mrs Weldon was an old family friend of the Grays in London and notorious in her own right.
Back in London Gray’s brother was not fully recovered and doctors recommended a sea voyage. Gray was working for the Pictorial World and the Editor secured him a ticket from the Orient Company to draw pictures for publicity purposes on a 12 week cruise to Palestine on the S.S. Garonne. It is on this cruise that he met Frank Brocklehurst and they become lifelong friends. Brocklehurst was the heir of a famous silk manufacturing family in Macclesfield. He spent much of his life travelling and Gray became his regular companion and beneficiary. On returning to London he joined Pegram at his new studio in Glebe Place in Chelsea and they were both asked to provide drawings for the new magazine The Idler being started in 1892 by Jerome K. Jerome of Four Men in a Boat fame.
