Figures & heads from the originals of Louthenbourg & Bossi

title page

With two plates after Marcellus Laroon both depicting Quakers, one showing a Quaker man and the second a Quaker woman, both dated 1690.

  • Author: Green, Benjamin, 1739-1798, printmaker.
  • Title: Figures & heads from the originals of Louthenbourg & Bossi [graphic] / by Ben. Green of X’s [i.e. Christ’s] Hospital.
  • Publication: [London] : [publisher not identified], 1773.

Catalog Record

75 G795 773

Acquired December 2023

After the invasion

description below

“Three volunteers or militiamen, three-quarter length figures, exult at the head of Bonaparte which one of them (right) holds up on a pitchfork, saying, “Here he is Exalted my Lads 24 Hours after Landing.” The head is in profile to the left, the sharp well-cut features contrast with those of the chubby yokels. The centre figure, holding out his hat, says, turning to the left: “Why Harkee, d’ye zee, I never liked Soldiering afore, but some how or other when I though [sic] of our Sal the bearns, the poor pigs, the Cows and the Geese, why I could have killed the whole Army my own Self.” He wears a smock with the crossed straps of a cartouche-box. The third man (left) in regimentals, but round-shouldered and unsoldierly, says: “Dang my Buttons if that beant the Head of that Rogue Boney – I told our Squire this Morning, what do you think say’s I the Lads of our Village can’t cut up a Regiment of them French Mounsheers, and as soon as the Lasses had given us a Kiss for good luck I could have sworn we should do it and so we have.” All three have hats turned up with favours and oak-twigs, the favours being inscribed respectively (left to right): ‘Hearts of Oak’; ‘Britons never will be Slaves’, and ‘We’ll fight and We’ll Conquer again and again’. In the spaces between these foreground figures is seen a distant encounter between English horse and foot and French invaders, who are being driven into the sea, on which are flat-bottomed boats, all on a very small scale. Two women search French corpses; one says: “why this is poor finding I have emtied the pocketts of a score and only found one head of garlic 9 onions & a parcel of pill Boxes.” Cf. British Museum Satires No. 8145.”–British Museum online catalogue.

  • Printmaker: Williams, Charles, active 1797-1830, printmaker.
  • Title: After the invasion [graphic] : the levée en masse, or, Britons strike home.
  • Publication: [London] : Pub. Augt. 6th, 1803, by S.W. Fores, 50 Piccadilly, [6 August 1803]

Catalog Record

802.08.06.01+

Acquired April 2023

Hell hounds rallying round the idol of France

description below

“A colossal but life-like bust of Napoleon is placed on a mound of decollated human heads. He gazes fixedly upwards in profile to the left; round his neck and bare breast is twisted a noose of rope. Round this idol dance demons with human heads, holding hands. They are naked except for head-coverings, and have horns, hairy legs, tail, with one leg terminating in a cloven hoof, the other in the claw of a bird of prey. These ‘Hell Hounds’ have labels hanging from a collar of rope, showing that they are ‘Caulincourt’, ‘Fouché’, ‘Savory’, with a pen in his hat (he succeeded Fouché as Minister of Police in 1810), ‘Vandamme’, ‘Davoust’, ‘Ney’, ‘Lefebre’. Two demons fly towards the emperor, holding a large wreath which is on fire, with the inscription ‘He Deserves A Crown of Pitch.’ This they are about to place on the idol’s head, towards which gallops through the air a small demon (right) on a goat, blowing a horn. In the foreground lie dead and dying soldiers, one is decapitated, another (right) is naked and has lost an arm which he holds out with an agonized expression towards the idol. In the background (left) soldiers are feeding a bonfire with ‘English Goods’. On the right is a blazing town.”–British Museum online catalogue.

 

  • Printmaker: Rowlandson, Thomas, 1756-1827, printmaker.
  • Title: Hell hounds rallying round the idol of France [graphic].
  • Publication: [London] : Pubd. April 8, 1815, by R. Ackermann, No. 101 Strand, [8 April 1815]

Catalog record

815.04.08.01+

Acquired November 2022