Notes for a biography on William Ingalton of Eton (1794 – 1866).
William Ingalton’s family originally came from Worplesdon,
a tiny village about 25 miles south-west of London. The artist’s father, also called William, was
born in 1767 and he had two sisters, Sarah and Ann. I have not been able to trace William
Senior’s parents, but we know he had an uncle John who was married to an
Elizabeth. John and Elizabeth had six
children, one of whom was Thomas, bookseller and publisher, and his five children were William the
artist’s cousins. These cousins included
Thomas Junior, also a bookseller, and Henry, a builder.
In 1791 William Senior, the bootmaker, married Sarah
Passenger. Their first child, William
the artist, was born in 1794. Their
second child, Ann, was William the artist’s only sibling.
Around 1800 the whole extended Ingalton family moved from
Worplesdon to Eton. The family was
strongly involved with the Anglican Church and the move to Eton appears to have
had something to do with that allegiance. William Senior became a respected and
successful boot and shoemaker at number 17 High Street, Eton.
Thomas Ingalton Senior’s bookshop, at the Thames end of
Eton High Street, was also successful.
Thomas was not only a bookseller but a printer, bookbinder and
publisher. He supplied stationary and
art materials, sold lottery tickets and was an agent for the Sun, Fire &
Life Insurance Company. He probably sold William Ingalton’s paintings. He certainly published and sold prints that
would have been displayed in his shop window.
William Ingalton himself produced a few lithographs of
local scenes in 1821. Producing
lithographs in 1821 indicates that he was up-to-date. The first book on lithography in English, A Complete Course in Lithography by the inventor of the process,
Alois Senefelder, had been published in London only two years before.
Nothing is known about the artist from his birth in 1794
until he begins to exhibit paintings in 1816 at the age of 22. Because of references in the 1930s book Chronological History of the Old English
Landscape Painters by Colonel Grant, it seems likely that he was taught by
the older Eton artist Edmund Bristow (1787 – 1876) about whom almost nothing is
known either. Bristow also lived in Eton
High Street and was apparently reclusive by nature. But, if we sift through the titles of his
works we see titles similar to those used by Ingalton, which may support the
idea that Bristow was Ingalton’s mentor.
For example, Bristow
paints The rehearsal – Ingalton
paints The village concert; Bristow Off to market - Ingalton Preparing
for the fair; Bristow The end of the
chapter - Ingalton An interesting
paragraph; Bristow Nine pins –
Ingalton The skittle players.
The only other artist of note in Eton at the time was the
watercolourist William Evans (1798 –
1877). In the book William Evans of Eton, published in 1998, there is a reference that,
in1820, Evans worked together with William Ingalton on an altarpiece. The altarpiece is now lost.
In 1821 the two artists combined again to produce a book of
6 lithographs, titled Lithographic
Sketches of Eton, Windsor and the Neighbourhood. Three of the lithographs are by Ingalton
and the other three are by Evans. There
appears to be only one copy of this book in the world. (The British Library does not have a copy,
nor does any other library). This one
surviving copy may have been a proof copy and commercial production may not
have proceeded. (This copy was bought on
Ebay by the author).
In the 1820s both Ingalton and Evans signed a petition against Enclosures around Eton. Townsfolk had taken up the fight against the
plan of one John Penn to enclose land surrounding his Manor Farm House near
Eton. Penn was trying to enclose the common land and re-organise
the farmland into ‘more effective’ field sizes. The Enclosure process in Britain has been
described by some historians as ‘class robbery’. George Orwell wrote: ‘In the case of the
enclosure of the common lands, which was going on from about 1600 to 1850, the
land-grabbers did not even have the excuse of being foreign conquerors; they
were quite frankly taking the heritage of their own countrymen, upon no sort of
pretext except that they had the power to do so’. In Eton, a compromise was apparently reached
in 1822 when 200 acres
of the Common were allotted to the poor.
The remaining 260 acres of the common was to be divided among about 50
individuals. But Penn’s plan was eventually
defeated in Parliament in 1826. According
to an article elsewhere on the Eton Wick History Group website, ‘the village
celebrated with bonfires and feasting, no doubt helped along with the beer and
home-made wines of the day’.
There is a brief
reference to Ingalton in Passages of a Working Life
- During Half a Century with a Prelude of Early Reminiscences by Charles Knight who published the Windsor & Eton Express before
becoming a publisher of national significance.
Around 1820 Knight was still in Eton, taking a keen interest in the
conditions of the poor and advocating moderate reform. His book outlines his work with the
Parish Vestry and as Overseer of the Poor.
Artist William Ingalton, incidentally, later holds these positions.
Charles Knight, however, did not support the idea of
indiscriminate handouts to the poor, or even ‘liberal parish allowances
according to the number of children in a family’. Such an approach, he claimed, did not address
the root cause of the problem. But he
was always happy to discuss the issue with those who held such ‘benevolent
convictions’. Knight writes:
… Such were, to some extent, the convictions of
one of the shrewdest and most warm-hearted of self-taught men with whom it was
ever my happiness to become acquainted. Mr. Ingalton had a flourishing business
as a shoemaker at Eton. His son, a young artist of great promise, was for some
years the most intimate companion of my leisure; and he is one of the few whom
time has spared to show me how justly I esteemed him. In his painting-room I have had many a
friendly argument with his intelligent father.
There was another
occasional visitor of that painting room, [a clergyman/scholar] who was ready
to discuss controverted subjects of social economy, with a perfect theoretical
knowledge, but with the practical earnestness of a Christian love for his
fellow-creatures. Often have I listened
with real delight to an instructive dialogue between the refined [clergyman/scholar]
and the thoughtful [shoemaker] who was not wanting in book-knowledge but was
stronger in his mother wit. I see his
stately figure in his working garb - fresh from the ‘cutting out’ of his
back-shop - standing side by side with the tall and thin clergyman before his
son's easel, and discoursing with no ordinary
knowledge of the principles of Art, upon the composition of the Cottage Interior or the Village Concert.
The characters of
the English scenes which his son painted, in the days of Wilkie, were studies
from life; and thus the transition of talk was natural enough from the picture
to the reality. The accomplished divine, who was not unfamiliar with many an
abode of poverty, was a patient listener to every plea for tenderness to the
improvident, and of compassion for the ignorant followers of things evil. But he believed in more enduring help than
casual charity. A few years before, he
had proclaimed the great principle that ‘the only true secret of assisting the
poor is to make them agents in bettering their own condition, and to supply
them, not with a temporary stimulus, but with a permanent energy... ’
The
‘occasional visitor’ to the Ingalton residence, was John Bird Sumner, a future
Archbishop of Canterbury. At the time,
around 1820, Bird Sumner was a master at Eton College.
The publisher Charles Knight was a Malthusian, a passionate
believer in Thomas Malthus’s idea that, while food production increases at a
sequential rate - 1, 2, 3, 4 - population increases at an exponential rate - 1,
2, 4, 8, 16. Malthusians believed that catastrophic
famine and poverty lay up ahead. Popular
solutions offered at the time to the over-population problem included sexual
abstinence, of course, and the delaying of marriage. Even if Malthus was wrong, late marriage, it
was argued, had the benefit of ensuring security, respectability and happiness
for children when you eventually did have them.
When William Ingalton marries Sarah Ann Emlyn,
on 17 April, 1823, he is 29 and she is 25. This would have been considered older than
usual. It is probable that there could
have been a long engagement because Ingalton, too, believed in the Malthusian
idea of ‘late marriage’. The marriage eventually occurs a couple of
months after Ingalton’s New Road to
Matrimony; or the New Marriage Act is hung at the British Institution.
Ingalton’s wife Sarah Ann, is the daughter of local builder
James Emlyn. The family historian who is
researching the Emlyn family, Marion Baker, has provided a family tree. There is little she can tell us about the artist William
Ingalton and she is certain that no archive of Ingalton’s papers or preparatory
sketches has survived.
Sarah Ann is the sister of Henry Emlyn Junior
with whom William will go into partnership as a builder, after he virtually
gives up painting around 1826. The Emlyns had been builders for generations. The best-known of them is Henry Junior’s
uncle, Henry Emlyn Senior, who is noted for his innovative architectural
and building work in St George’s Chapel in Windsor Castle. James Emlyn, William Ingalton’s father-in-law worked
for Windsor Parish Church as Chapter Carpenter from 1792 to 1825. Henry Emlyn Junior, was Chapter bricklayer
from 1812 -1833.
In 1825 tragedy strikes the Ingalton family. First of all,
Ingalton’s first child, Mary, who was born in 1824, dies on 2 June, 1825. Another daughter, who is born shortly after
this, is also named Mary. Ingalton will have two more daughters, Maria,
born in 1828 and Ellen Ann, born in 1833.
On 25 August, 1825, William Senior dies at the age of
58. His death is actually recorded in a
diary entry by William Gladstone, the future British Prime Minister, when he
was a 16-year old student at Eton College: ‘Ingalton
the shoemaker had died’.
These events
must have had a severe effect on the artist. One of the consistent reports in the brief
biographical entries on Ingalton is that he suffered a severe illness around
this time. With the death of his first
child followed so closely by the death of his highly-esteemed father, I imagine
Ingalton’s illness could have been stress-related.
Probate on the father’s will is proven on 19 January,
1826. The amount is £2000. In the probate records for William Senior,
dated 19 January 1826, William Junior is listed as the executor of his father’s
estate. William Junior’s profession,
however, is given not as ‘artist’ or ‘painter’ but as ‘carpenter’. And we know that 1826 is the last year in
which William Junior exhibits paintings.
After William Senior’s death, the boot-making business is
maintained successfully at 17 High Street, Eton, in the hands of his widow
and/or his spinster sister (both named Sarah).
His other sister, Ann, who also remains unmarried, is a milliner.
After 1826, Ingalton Junior does paint an
occasional landscape, even though he ceases to exhibit. He’s now a full-time builder in partnership
with his wife’s brother, Henry Emlyn Junior. However, a report in the London Gazette indicates that the
partnership was dissolved ‘by mutual consent on the 31st day of December 1831’ and that the building business
was to be carried on by William Ingalton alone, and ‘all debts owing by the late
Partnership will be paid by the said William Ingalton’. I can find no reference as to why this occurred.
Occasional reports in the Windsor & Eton Express throughout
the 1830s picture Ingalton as an increasingly successful businessman,
liberal-minded and an ongoing supporter of social causes. We know
that in the 1820s he protested against the Enclosures around Eton which were
being planned by the wealthy John Penn.
And he appears to have continued his wholehearted support of the needs of
the poor and the unfairly treated.
The Windsor
& Eton Express of the 15 October, 1831, reports him as the instigator of
a Reform Meeting and, on 9 January, 1836, in a report on ‘branch-stacking’
headed ‘Barefaced Treachery’, he is named as a reformer opposing a take-over of
the local Council by workers from Windsor Castle. At the same time he remains tied to the
Church and is a churchwarden at St John’s, working alongside the Reverend Isaac
Gosset who had conducted Ingalton’s marriage service in St
John’s Anglican Church in High Street, Windsor. Ingalton becomes a member of the New
Windsor Vestry chaired by Gosset.
Ingalton’s
building company drew up plans for the new Poor Houses. In 1834 he is appointed Overseer for the Poor, New
Windsor. In this role he can help
arrange apprenticeships for orphans and for paupers’ children, for example. In
1835 he is a Windsor Parish Officer and on the ‘Dispensary Committee’ which
raises money for, and supervises the distribution of, medicines and is involved
with other matters of public health. In
1835 and 1838 it is reported that he is a candidate for the position of Windsor
Guardian of the Poor. And it seems that
each year, for a bit of fun, he would bedeck a barge for the ‘Water Excursion
of the Windsor Glee Club’.
In the 1841 census William Ingalton
described himself as an inventor. Indeed
there is a report in the Windsor &
Eton Express on 24th March,
1838, which refers to Ingalton being involved in the development of fire-proof
vaults for banks.
In the 1840s
Ingalton is still on the
Windsor council but a report in The Times
of 3 November 1843 indicates that he is now considered ‘a conservative’. In the 1853 edition of Musson & Craven’s Commercial Directory: County of Buckinghamshire,
he appears amongst the short list of Gentry living in Clewer, adjacent to
Windsor.
There are a couple more clues about
Ingalton’s character and beliefs. In
1844 the Reverend Thomas Thellusson Carter, who had been a student at Eton
College with future Prime Minister Gladstone, becomes Rector at the tiny town
of Clewer. Ingalton must have known
him. There is an illustration by
Ingalton, titled Clewer Church in 1844,
in Life and Letters of Thomas Thellusson
Carter. Carter was famous for
assisting in the establishment of the House of Mercy in Clewer, ‘for the
rescue of fallen women’. Gladstone was a great supporter of
the Clewer House of Mercy at exactly the time William Ingalton settled in
Clewer.
Given that Gladstone had made a diary entry,
when he was a student at Eton, that ‘Ingalton the shoemaker had died’, Gladstone must have known, or was at least
aware of, Ingalton’s father. Gladstone’s
diary also reveals that he did business with Ingalton’s bookselling uncle
Thomas. So it’s possible that Ingalton the
artist met, or knew, Gladstone at that time.
And it is quite possible that Ingalton later supported Gladstone’s
crusade in Clewer for the rescue of ‘fallen women’.
William Ingalton died in 1866 at the age of
72. His will is not very revealing. He used a ‘hop factor’, or hop merchant, as
executor for his will. Two of his three
daughters remained unmarried. The third
married a brewer but, as far as I can tell, she remained childless. This would explain why the family line has
petered out, why there are no Ingaltons in the Windsor or London phone books
today. The wills of Ingalton’s daughters
do not provide much information about their father, nor any clues as to where
his other paintings may be found.
Catalogue
Raisonné – William Ingalton (1794 –
1866)
The
Wedding Ring
2’7” x
2’2” (size given in the British Institution catalogue and includes the frame)
Exhibited
Royal Academy 1816 (no. 151)
Exhibited
at the British Institution 1817 (no. 154)
Comments:
Unlocated. The marriage theme is emerging in 1816 when Ingalton first exhibits
at the age of 22.
The
Hoppers’ Harvest Home
2’5” x
3’6” (size given in the British Institution catalogue and includes the frame)
Exhibited
at the British Institution 1816 (no. 250)
Comments:
Unlocated. Ingalton used a Harry Emlyn Jones,
‘hop merchant’ as an executor to his will [made in 1865]. In their wills of
1889 Ingalton’s two spinster daughters, Ellen and
Maria, use the same Harry Emlyn Jones, ‘hop factor [commission agent], of 11
St. Thomas's Street, Southwark’ as executor. Ingaltons’ other daughter married
a brewer. This painting almost certainly depicted a brewing scene following the
bringing home of the hop harvest. It is
possibly this painting which is depicted hanging on the wall of Portraits of a Lady and a Gentleman at
breakfast (see below).
Harvest
Home; a fine specimen
Sold
Sotheby’s March 27, 1839 £11.2
Bought
by Walsh. Lugt no. 15354
Comments:
Unlocated. No date available but almost certainly the same painting as the one
above. Information, including the title from the Sotheby’s catalogue, is from
the Getty Provenance Index. This is the
only reference to Ingalton in the Getty Provenance Index. The dropping of the
word ‘hoppers’’ from the title by Sotheby’s in 1839 might have something to do
with the strength of the Temperance Movement at the time.
A
View on the Thames near Eton, 1816
Oil on
canvas
46 x 61
cm (approx 18” x 24”)
signed
and dated 1816
In the
Ashmolean Museum of Art and Archaeology, Oxford, England
Bequeathed
in 1899 by Mr. Charles Drury Edward Fortnum (the last of the Fortnums of
Fortnum and Mason, grocers, in Piccadilly, London).
The
Game of Putt
2’4” x
2’9” (size given in the British Institution catalogue and includes the frame)
Exhibited
at the British Institution 1817 (no. 220))
Comments:
Unlocated. Putt is golf or a form of golf . The Sporting Magazine in 1817 included a list
of ‘Sporting subjects exhibited in the British Institution’. About 50 paintings are mentioned (and 4
pieces of sculpture) including Ingalton’s The
Game of Putt.
The
Skittle Players
Exhibited
Royal Academy 1817 (no. 240)
Comments:
Unlocated. This, like the above painting, must have included a number of
figures.
A
Boat Yard at Eton
Exhibited
Royal Academy 1818 (no. 568)
Comments:
Unlocated.
The
Vestry
2’8” x
2’3” (size given in the British Institution catalogue and includes the frame)
Exhibited
at the British Institution 1818 (no. 243) and purchased by Robert Holford.
Comments:
Unlocated. From The Literary Gazette: A
Weekly Journal of Literature, Science and the Fine Arts – 1818, Page 138:
‘CCXLII. The Vestry… Pope Ganganelli, a patron of the arts, through not of
Protestant vestries (albeit a liberal pope) when consulted by a young painter,
whom he protected, gave him this cheering opinion, that having expression, he
possessed the first quality in art, and therefore must succeed. Upon the same ground we congratulate Mr.
Ingalton on his accomplishing this indispensable requisite in painting, not
doubting but that the other qualities of colouring, chiaro-scuro, relief,
&c. will be added in due time. The
Vestry is of great interest. It is too familiar, we fear, to artists, as well
as other men, in more ways than one, not to enter into all our associations,
and undoubtedly furnishes a legitimate subject for the pencil. Mr Ingalton has, however, forsaken the most
hackneyed, humorous path. His vestry is
held for the purpose of dealing out the parish dole to the poor and wretched;
and the objects selected for this charity, are marked with every circumstance
of varied misery, both in garb and feature.
It is evident that he has drawn from real life, and his drama, if not
highly finished, has all the excellence of truth and nature. His avoidance of positive colour is too
singular; and had his story not carried him out in this picture, it would have
shared the fate of ‘Preparing for the fair,’ which is bald and unmeaning’.
From The
Repository of arts, literature, commerce, manufactures, fashions and politics,
1818: ‘The Vestry. — W. Ingalton. The peculiar merit in this picture is the
striking and appropriate diffusion of character it presents. The story of the
poor applicants
for
parochial relief, and the manner in which it is received, is well told ; the
expression in some of the figures is hardly inferior to that in Wiikie's
‘Distraining for Rent’. As a work of art, however, it is faulty; the
perspective in the back-ground is bad; and the picture, as well as
the one
near it by the same artist, ‘Preparing for the Fair’, has a raw
and
chalky surface, which is unpleasant.’
Preparing
for the Fair
2’9” x
2’ (size given in the British Institution catalogue and includes the frame)
Exhibited
at the British Institution 1818 (no. 244)
Comments:
Unlocated. From The Literary Gazette: A
Weekly Journal of Literature, Science and the Fine Arts – 1818, Page 138:
‘… had his story not carried him out in this picture [ie in The Vestry – see above] it would have
shared the fate of ‘Preparing for the fair,’ which is bald and unmeaning’.
See
review of The Vestry in The Repository of arts, literature,
commerce, manufactures, fashions and politics, 1818 [above] which refers to
Preparing for the Fair.
View
near Windsor, Eton side
2’11” x
3’1” (size given in the British Institution catalogue and includes the frame)
Exhibited
at the British Institution 1819 (no 75)
Comments:
Unlocated.
The
Interesting Paragraph
2’8” x
3’ (size given in the British Institution catalogue and includes the frame)
Exhibited
at the British Institution 1819 (no. 94)
Comments:
Unlocated. Possibly a newspaper being read – a popular subject at the time,
painted by Wilkie among others. It is possibly this
is one of the paintings depicted hanging on the wall of Portraits of a Lady and a Gentleman at
breakfast (see below).
A
View of Eton College
Exhibited
Royal Academy 1819 (no. 364)
Comments:
Unlocated.
A
landscape
Exhibited
Royal Academy 1820 (no. 350)
Comments:
Unlocated. In a review of the RA The
London Literary Gazette and Journal of Belles Lettres, Arts, Sciences, Etc
for 1820 (p284) referred to ‘smaller but in various ways highly meritorious
works by… Ingalton…’.
A
Village Concert
3’ x 4’
(size given in the British Institution catalogue and includes the frame)
Exhibited
at the British Institution 1820 (no. 132)
Comments:
Unlocated. From Annals of Fine Art, 1820, page
149: ‘132. A Village Concert. W.
Ingalton. In the Style of Wilkie and manner of Bird, but inferior to both’. From
the Journal
of Belles Lettres p219 1820: ‘No. 132. A
Village Concert. – W. Ingalton. It is said that “In a multitude of
counsellors there is safety.” But of
art, it may be truly observed, that in a multitude of figures, there is danger;
more especially before the judgment is matured, and the practice sufficient to
enable the painter to dispose of them judiciously. Otherwise so many claims are made upon the
situation, that nothing is seen to advantage.
It is under this view we consider the Village Concert, in which there is
no want of individual excellence, or of just and striking expression, which
might have been husbanded to advantage. Something of meagreness is evident in
the present performance, which a better use of the means, and a more competent
knowledge of the fundamental principals of the art, will enable Mr. Ingalton to
overcome.’ A Village Concert nevertheless
sold (to Rob. Holford, Esq., as reported in Annals
of Fine Art, 1820, p142. The wealthy Holford created in the 1820s ‘a
fashionable must-have of the Regency era’, a formal pleasure garden. This is
now the National Arboretum in Gloucestershire.
(Cottage Interior)
referred
to by Charles Knight on page 192, vol. 1, of his Passages of a Working Life, Bradbury and Evans, 1964-65. (The Village Concert is referred to in the
same sentence).
Comments:
Unlocated.
Eton
College
2’11” x
3’5” (size given in the British Institution catalogue and includes the frame)
Exhibited
at the British Institution 1820 (no. 258)
Comments:
Unlocated.
Bargaining
for China
2’6” x
2’2” (size given in the British Institution catalogue and includes the frame)
Exhibited
Royal Academy 1820 (no. 215)
Exhibited
at the British Institution 1821 (no. 27)
Comments:
Unlocated. The Polytechnic and Scientific
Intelligence, 1820, commented that ‘No. 11. The Travelling Tinker, by Kidd, and No. 215, Bargaining for China, by Ingalton, are convincing proofs that both
artists have well studied nature’. When exhibited at the BI the following year
the London Journal for Arts and Science
commented: ‘We recognize also some old acquaintances, in the gallery, with whom
we have been pleased to have another interview; such as no. 27 Bargaining for China, by W. Ingalton’
(p136. 1821).
Portraits
of a Lady and a Gentleman at breakfast
Exhibited
Royal Academy 1821 (no. 304)
Oil on
wood panel (mahogany)
18” x
24”
signed on the side panel of writing desk ‘W. Ingalton
Eton’
stamped on the back with the name ‘R[obert]
Davy’.
Provenance: Unknown London auction house; London art
dealer; Art/antique dealer, Jack Hazen, New York, c1978; Mr Ron Chase, Seattle.
Comments:
Robert
Davy is listed in directories from 1811 where he is described as a carver and
gilder with a special interest in panels and millboards for use by painters in
oils. Davy claimed to supply the Royal
Academy and some of the artists who used his panels were Turner, Sir Thomas
Lawrence, Edwin Landseer and Clarkson Stanfield. William Blake's panel, The Virgin and Child, 1825, is on a Davy panel.
View
of Windsor Bridge
Exhibited
Royal Academy 1821 (no. 553)
Comments:
Unlocated? Possibly Eton, the Thames and
Eton Bridge in the Duke of Buccleuch Collection (no 629). See below.
View
on the Thames, near Windsor
2’10 x
3’6” (size given in the British Institution catalogue and includes the frame)
Exhibited
at the British Institution 1821 (no. 82)
Comments:
There is a photograph in the Witt Library. Details on the Witt card include:
‘Oil on
canvas, 25 ½” x 34”, Lord Fairhaven Collection (purchased from Leggatt, London,
1928)’. Illustrated (plate 196) in A
Chronological History of the Old English Landscape Painters (in Oil) from the
XVIth Century to the XIXth Century by Colonel M. H. Grant.
Windsor
from the Great Park
2’10” x
3’6” (size given in the British Institution catalogue and includes the frame)
Exhibited
at the British Institution 1821 (no. 268)
Comments:
Identifiable with Distant View of Windsor
in the Fairhaven Collection, Anglesey Abbey (Anglesey AA/P/190).
Illustrated (plate 6) in Windsor Castle
Though Three Centuries – a description and catalogue of the Windsor Collection
formed by Lord Fairhaven… by Cyril G. E. Bunt, 1949.
Sunset
over Windsor Castle, 1821
Panel
9 1/2
“x 14” (24 x 35.5 cm)
Comments:
A Witt card has the information that this was sold at Bonham’s, 18 Jan 1979
(the price was $A1019. There are two illustrations in the Witt Library which
also has it in the Bearsted Collection titled Windsor Castle from the River, Sunset and gives the provenance as
‘from the Collection of Colonel M. H. Grant, author of The Old English Landscape Painters’).
Eton
and the Thames, 1822
Oil
27 ½ ”
x 36”
signed
and dated 1822
Collection
of the Duke of Buccleuch, Bowhill, Scotland (no 631). The Buccleuch Collection
have also titled this work A View of
Fellows Eyot, Eton, and the River Thames.
Comments:
Illustration in the Witt. It seems probable that this would have been exhibited
at the RA or BI in 1822 or 1823
Eton
College, sunset
2’5” x
3’6” (size given in the British Institution catalogue and includes the frame)
Exhibited
at the British Institution 1822 (no. 154)
Comments:
Unlocated.
A
Scene in Windsor Forest
2’4” x
4’11”
Exhibited
at the British Institution 1822 (no. 247)
Comments:
Unlocated.
Windsor,
sunrise
2’6 x
3’ (size given in the British Institution catalogue and includes the frame)
Exhibited
at the British Institution 1822 (no. 295)
Comments:
A painting titled Windsor is reported
as having been sold from the 1822 BI exhibition to a Mr Hoare. (Newspaper
clipping, National Art Library, V & A). This could refer to this painting
or to the one above.
Walter
Francis, 5th Duke of Buccleugh [sic] and 7th Duke of Queensbury [1806
– 1884] and his brother Lord John Scott [1809
– 1860] as boys at Eton College in
boating dress.
Oil on
panel
23 ½ ”
x 17 ½ ”
signed
& dated 1822
Collection
of the Duke of Buccleuch Collection, Bowhill (no. 651).
(The
Buccleuch Collection has another version of this work housed at Boughton House
[BH293] and is also on panel, 23 ¾ x 18”).
Illustration
in the Witt Library
Comments:
This may be Waiting for the Boat; a study
on the 4th June at Eton (the painting below) since the two young
men seem to be waiting for a boat.
Waiting
for the Boat; a study on the 4th June at Eton
3’ x
2’6” (size given in the British Institution catalogue and includes the frame)
Exhibited
at the British Institution 1823 (no. 308)
Comments:
Since the size given in the BI catalogue includes the frame this is almost
certainly the above painting, which must have a 6”-wide frame. The 4th
of June is the College Speech Day.
The
New Road to Matrimony; or the New Marriage Act
61 x
91.4 cm
oil on
oak panel
signed
with fake signature ‘Wilkie’
Exhibited
at the British Institution 1823 (no. 188) where the size, including frame, is
given as 2’10” x 3’6”
The
artist’s address in the BI catalogue is given simply as Eton.
Provenance:
The artist; Thomas Hurst of Hurst Robinson & Co; unidentified
forger, possibly a ‘gentleman’ horse-racing identity; Thomas Cook,
pianoforte manufacturer; Foster’s Auction, London, 30 November, 1921 (sold as a
Wilkie); William Joseph Wadham, artist and art dealer; Wadham
Art Gallery, Pomeroy House, 9 Barrack Street, Sydney, August, 1922 (as a
Wilkie); Kenneth Stewart, antiquarian book dealer; Ross Quito,
bookseller and collector; Athol Kirkland, catering manager; Sally Ann Collier,
merchant banker; private collection, Sydney, Australia.
Comments: The painting was mentioned in The Monthly Magazine, or British Register (vol. LV, 1823, p.249) as
part of its review of the 1823 BI exhibition: ‘- (188) The New Road to
Matrimony; W. Ingalton. In tone, very
transparent; in subject, somewhat ambiguous’.
The
Battle Interrupted
2’8” x
2’3” (size given in the British Institution catalogue and includes the frame)
Exhibited
Royal Academy 1823 (no. 60)
Exhibited
at the British Institution 1824 (no. 240)
Comments: Unlocated. The subject of this
painting probably stems from an anecdote related to novelist Sir Walter Scott
(related to the Duke of Buccleuch) recorded in Lockhart's Life of Scott (iii. 327): ‘When [Scott’s] Lady
of the Lake first reached Sir Adam Fergusson, he was posted with his
company on a point of ground exposed to the enemy's artillery… The men were
ordered to lie prostrate on the ground; while they kept that attitude, the
Captain, kneeling at their head, read aloud the description of the battle in
Canto VI., and the listening soldiers only interrupted him by a joyous huzza
whenever the French shot struck the bank close above them.’ A reviewer of the Life of Scott had commented ‘What a subject for the painter – for
Wilkie, for instance – a friend of both Scott and Ferguson’ (‘New York Review
1840).
In Charles Molloy Westmacott’s, A descriptive and critical Catalogue to the Exhibition of the Royal
Academy… 1823 there is a mention
of Ingalton’s The Battle Interrupted
with a typographical error referring to artist as ‘W Ingalston’ (sic). Westmacott’s comment is as follows: ‘A clever
forcible picture of great promise, with strong proofs of genius’.
The
New Arrival
Oil on
panel
21 1/2”
x 30” (54.6 x 76.2 cm)
signed
and dated W. Ingalton 1823
Sold at
Christie’s Kensington 24 October, 1991, lot 169, estimate £1200-1800, sold for
$A1700.
Comments:
This was the only painting by William Ingalton listed on the Art Sales Index
website until Eton from the river was
offered at Bonham’s in London on 30 March, 2007. On the basis of the date and
the size it is virtually certain that it is identifiable with The First Visit to Grand Mamma (see
below). The theme, therefore, would relate to family life and marriage. Alas it
is not illustrated in the Christie’s catalogue (a copy of which is held at the
Art Gallery of NSW). At my request Christie’s sent letters to the purchaser,
who apparently lived in Pisa, but this person did not respond. This work is
identifiable with The First Visit to
Grand Mamma
(see
below).
The
First Visit to Grand Mamma
2’8” x
3’4” (size given in the British Institution catalogue and includes the frame)
Exhibited
at the British Institution 1824 (no. 287 )
Comments:
Unlocated. Theme of family life (relating to marriage). This is almost
certainly The New Arrival above. (By
adding 5” all around, for the frame, to the size of The New Arrival one gets the same measurements as The First Visit to Grand Mamma).
The
Old Bridge at Windsor
Exhibited
at the Society of British Artists 1824 (no. 8)
Comments:
Unlocated.
The
Rectory at Worplesdon, Surry, with the Clandon and Sutton Woods in the
distance.
Exhibited
at the Society of British Artists 1824 (no. 216)
Comments:
Unlocated.
Windsor
Castle from the Thames
Exhibited
at the Society of British Artists 1824 (no. 314)
Comments:
Unlocated.
A
view on the Sussex Coast
Exhibited
at the Society of British Artists 1826 (no. 180)
Comments:
Unlocated.
Old
Cottages at Eton
Exhibited
at the Society of British Artists 1826 (no. 288)
Comments:
Unlocated.
View
of Eton,
Oil on
canvas
71.5 x
91 cm (approx 2’4” x 3’)
signed
and dated 1834 lower right
Government
Art Collection; purchased from Spink & Son, November 1953. Used as
advertisement for Spink & Sons in Country
Life, July, 1952. Black and white Illustration in the Witt Library and
colour illustration on GAC website.
Comments:
This is signed ‘W. G. Ingalton’ and dated 1834.
Given the date, it may have been painted as a gift for Dr John Keate who
resigned from the position of headmaster at Eton College in 1834. (Student
numbers had dramatically declined in 1833.
Keate was a classical scholar, disciplinarian and apparently a ferocious
flogger but in retirement became (‘mellow’).
From
the Witt Library (undated works illustrated in the Witt Library)
Eton
from the River
Panel
11 1/2
x 16 ¾
Collection
of Eton College.
Comments:
This has been sighted. There are three
different labels on the reverse. One
simply has the artist’s name and the painting’s title, another is a dealer’s
label which reads: ‘Thos. Agnew & Sons Ltd/No. 22430/London 43 Old Bond
Street, Piccadilly, W.’ There is also a much darker label which would have been
on the wooden panel when Ingalton began painting on it. This reads: ‘Prepared by/R DAVY/16 Wardour
Street Soho/The original manufactures for Italian & Flemish grounds on
panels/The sole inventor of/prepared paper for sketching in oil/Est 1798/None
genuine but those marked on the back.’ This is a smaller version of the major
work in the Duke of Buccleuch Collection.
Eton,
the Thames and Eton Bridge
27 1/2
x 36”
Duke of
Buccleuch Collection (no. B629)
Comments:
An impressive example of Ingalton’s work which includes a few figures to the
left. Ingalton’s lithograph of Windsor Bridge (1821) is based on this image.
Possibly exhibited Royal Academy 1821 (no. 553) see above.
A
View of Eton
Illustrated
in The Illustrated [London News?] Feb 25 1950, together with a line of
biography.
Comments:
Unlocated.
Not
otherwise recorded
Clewer
Church in 1844
watercolour
Comments:
This is illustrated in Life and Letters by
the Rev. Thomas Thellusson Carter (Longmans, London, 1904). The date of the picture, as recorded in the
book, confirms that Ingalton continued to paint, at least occasionally, after
1826.
Comments:
The original is unlocated.
View
of Eton from the River
Oil
Photograph
with author. Original not sighted. Size to be confirmed
Warre
House, Eton College.
Lazy Days on the River Bank
at Eton
Oil on canvas
60.4 cm x 82.5 cm
Sold at Christie’s, London, 5 August, 2008, lot 46
(for £8125). The provenance was given as Arthur Ackermann & Peter Johnson Collection.
Comments: This work was previously sold at Bonham’s,
London, 6 December, 2007, lot 348 as Eton from the River (for £750.
Prior to that it had been offered at Bonham’s in London on
30 March, 2007, estimate: £2,000 - 3,000, but went unsold). There is a black and white
reproduction of this work in the Witt Library (possibly from ‘The Illustrated
London News’, Feb. 25, 1950 – the title of the periodical has been partly
obscured) and it is recorded as being in the E. P. Richardson Collection,
NMAA/NPG Library. A handwritten note on this reproduction refers to the dealer
‘Leggatt, London, 1950’, implying that Leggatt may have had it for sale. The
image of this painting relates to the lithograph Eton, Evening (see below)
Prints
In the
Royal Collection at Windsor Castle there are 2 lithographs by William Ingalton:
700993 Windsor Bridge
18 x 25
cm (image size)
signed
and dated 1821 in plate lower left
inscribed
with title in plate lower right
inscribed
below image ‘Drawn from Nature & on stone by W. Ingalton’ lower right
inscribed
below image ‘printed by C. Hullmandel’ lower right
Inscribed
with title and ‘Eton: Published by W. Ingalton Nov 15. 1821’ lower centre.
Another
copy in the collection of the Stephen Scheding.
Comments:
The image is based on William Ingalton’s oil in the Buccleuch Collection. The
image is also probably the same as number 227 in the Eton Loan Collection
Catalogue (see below).
700864 Windsor Castle from the Great Park
17 x
24.8 cm
signed
and dated 1821 in plate lower left
inscribed
below image ‘Drawn from Nature & on stone by W. Ingalton’ lower left
inscribed
below image ‘printed by C. Hullmandel’ lower right
inscribed
with title below image & ‘Eton. Published by W. Ingalton: London, by W. H.
Carpenter, 58 Brook Street.’
Inscribed
with title and ‘Eton: Published by W. Ingalton Nov 15. 1821’ lower centre.
Comment:
This is based on the Ingalton oil painting of the same title in the Fairhaven
Collection.
The
following 5 titles are listed in The Eton
Loan Collection Catalogue, by F. H. Rawlins, printed by R Ingalton Drake, Eton, 1891. Full title: Loan Collection of portrait, views and other
objects of interest, connected with the history of Eton: made on the occasion
of the 450th anniversary of the foundation of the college. This
exhibition included about 143 portraits (including Portrait of Beau Brummell by Wilkie) and about 60 views around Eton
in various media. Edmund Bristow, William Evans and Paul Sandby were
represented). No sizes are given. The prints catalogued as being by Ingalton
are:
217 Eton from the Thames, 1821, etching by
W. Ingalton. Lent by A. C. Benson, Esq.
218 Eton Wharf, 1821, etching by W.
Ingalton. Lent by A. C. Benson, Esq.
219 Eton from the Sixth Form Bench, etching
by W. Ingalton. Lent by A. C. Benson, Esq.
227 Windsor Bridge, 1821, Lithograph by W.
Ingalton. Lent by A. C. Benson, Esq. (A copy is in the Queen’s collection, see
above)
228 Eton – Evening, 1821, Lithographed by W.
Ingalton. Lent by A. C. Benson, Esq.
Also in
Windsor Castle is a series of 5 etchings, each inscribed ‘Eton, Published June
1821… by T Ingalton’ each approximately 16 x 23 cm. They are quite sketchy.
They do not bear an artist’s name but all appear to be by the same hand.
However, because at least two are identifiable with two listed by F. H. Rawlins
(see above) the five are all probably by William Ingalton.
Titles:
Eton
from the Thames
Eton
Wharf
Eton
from the Arched Bridge
School
Yard
Eton
Common
Windsor from the Brocas,
1821, lithograph, 18 x 25 cm. Collection of Stephen Scheding, purchased
from Sanders of Oxford, July 2008. This copy has the title and artist's name
inscribed below the image in pencil.
Also in
the collection of Stephen Scheding is an unbound book of 6 lithographs, titled Lithographic Sketches of Eton, Windsor and the Neighbourhood by W
Ingalton and W Evans. It is possible that this might be the only extant copy of
this book. It has a handwritten inscription in ink on the illustrated cover:
‘London. Printed for W. H. Carpenter/Lower Brook St - 10/6’. This might suggest
that this was a proof copy and that commercial publication did not
proceed. Three of the lithographs in the
book are by William Ingalton and three are by William Evans. The lithograph on
the cover is not signed by either artist. The seven sheets are 28.5 x 38 cm
each. The contents are:
The front cover has a lithographed illustration of Eton College Chapel
from across the Thames, with printed title (Lithographic Sketches of Eton,
Windsor and the Neighbourhood
by W Ingalton and W Evans)
and hand written ink inscription: ‘London.
Printed for W. H. Carpenter/Lower Brook St - 10/6’, on grey tinted paper. The
back cover is plain grey tinted paper.
Windsor Morning, lithograph, signed in plate ‘W. Evans/1821’
lower right, titled in plate lower left, letterpress inscription below image
lower left: ‘Drawn on Stone by W. Evans’, letterpress inscription below image
lower right: ‘Printed by C. Hullmandel’; letterpress title below image lower
centre and letterpress inscription below image lower centre: ‘Eton College.
Published by W. Evans. London, by W. H. Carpenter, 58 Lower Brook Street. Decr
10. 1821’
Windsor Bridge, lithograph, signed in plate ‘W. Ingalton/1821’
lower left, titled in plate lower right, letterpress inscription below image
lower left: ‘Drawn from Nature & on Stone by W. Ingalton’, letterpress
inscription below image lower right: ‘Printed by C. Hullmandel’; letterpress
title below image lower centre and letterpress inscription below image lower
centre: ‘Eton. Published by W. Ingalton. London, Novr 15. 1821’. [Other copies
listed above. The image relates to Ingalton’s oil in the
Buccleuch Collection].
Windsor Castle from the Great Park, lithograph, signed in plate ‘W. Ingalton/1821’ lower
left, letterpress inscription below image lower left: ‘Drawn from Nature &
on Stone by W. Ingalton’, letterpress inscription below image lower right:
‘Printed by C. Hullmandel’; letterpress title below image lower centre and
letterpress inscription below image lower centre: ‘Eton. Published by W.
Ingalton. London, by W. H. Carpenter 58 Lower Brook St.’. [A copy is in the
Royal Collection at Windsor Castle, see above. The image relates to Ingalton’s oil in the
Buccleuch Collection].
Eton College, From the Playing
Fields, lithograph, signed in
plate ‘W. Evans 1821’ lower right, titled in plate lower right, letterpress
inscription below image lower left: ‘Drawn from Nature and on Stone by W.
Evans’, letterpress inscription below image lower right: ‘Printed by C.
Hullmandel’; letterpress title below image lower centre and letterpress
inscription below image lower centre: ‘Eton. Published by W. Ingalton [sic].
Novr 15. 1821.’
Sheep Bridge Playing Field, lithograph, signed in plate ‘W. Evans 1821’
lower left, letterpress inscription below image lower left: ‘Drawn from Nature
and on Stone by W. Evans’, letterpress inscription below image lower right:
‘Printed by C. Hullmandel’; letterpress title below image lower centre and
letterpress inscription below image lower centre: ‘Eton College. Published by
W. Evans. London, by W. H. Carpenter 58 Lower Brook Street.’
Eton Evening, lithograph, titled in plate lower right,
letterpress inscription below image lower left: ‘Drawn from Nature & on
Stone by W. Ingalton’, letterpress inscription below image lower right:
‘Printed by C. Hullmandel’; letterpress title below image lower centre and
letterpress inscription below image lower centre: ‘Eton. Published by W. Ingalton,
Novr 15. 1821’. [Other copies listed above. The image relates to Ingalton’s oil
sold at Christie’s, London, 5
August, 2008, see above].
No comments:
Post a Comment