496 1507
Acquired January 2022
“Portrait of G.F. Handel, from a painting by Hogarth, then in the etcher’s collection; bust directed to the right, looking towards the viewer, in fur-trimmed cap and coat.”–British Museum online catalogue.
830.00.00.164+
Acquired January 2022
“Copy of a man with shaven head (James Figg) in casual dress, holding quarter-staff in his right hand and round-brimmed hat in the left, standing whole length to front in a landscape, with head tilted to right, glancing towards the viewer, smiling with lips parted; after a painting by Hogarth in a private collection.”–British Museum online catalogue.
842.00.00.07+
Acquired December 2021
A group portrait of George III, Queen Charlotte, and their thirteen surviving children each numbered with a key below. The youngest children play with kites and marbles. In the background Princess Amelia (the youngest) jumps into the arms of her brother, Prince Ernest Augustus. The older members of the family form small groupings that are engaged in conversation. In the foreground are books, charts, and globes, suggesting their education and cultural pursuits.
785.00.00.119
Acquired February 2022
“Portrait after Reynolds (?); standing almost half-length to right beside a bust, eyes to front, hat under his left arm and his hand inside his coat.”–British Museum online catalogue
Portraits T753He no.1+
Acquired June 2021
Portrait of Stephen Lushington, half-length in profile to the right, in wig and barristers gown
821.03.12.01
Acquired October 2021
“Portrait, half-length, seated to front, with head turned to look to left, his right forearm leaning on a table, holding a telescope; wearing armour, and folded fabric draped over his right shoulder; curtain at left; after Joshua Reynolds (Mannings 1762).”–British Museum online catalogue, description of scratched-letter state.
Portraits T753G no.1
Acquired June 2021
“A broadside on Matthew Skeggs, a publican who became famous for miming music-making with a broomstick while making matching vocal sounds; with a round mezzotint after a painting by Thomas King, showing Skeggs facing towards the right, next to the portrait an etched broomstick surmounted by a dancing hog, and a suspended horn; with engraved title and verses of one poem and of one song text by Henry Howard in two columns.”–British Museum online catalogue.
File 763 752 H83+
Acquired October 2021
“Portrait of George Townshend standing three-quarter length slightly to left and leaning his right elbow on pedestal beside curtain, eyes to front, wearing uniform, his own hair curled, holding paper in his right hand labelled ‘A Bill Intituled, An Act for the Better Order of the Militia Forces.”–British Museum online catalogue, description of an earlier state.
Portraits T753G no.2
Acquired June 2021
Two volumes of engraved portraits of notable, mostly British, statesmen, academics, churchmen, authors, and actors taken from 18th- and 19th-century publications. Many of the portraits have been carefully trimmed around the figure, with the title mount below and the page annotated with the birth and death dates of the subject. Others have been trimmed carefully to remove the background but preserve the frames. The arrangement of volume one with the spine label “Portraits” is unclear: the first portraits are removed and missing (although some laid in prints may have been removed from their mounts) and some volumes leaves have been cut out, but the first of the surviving approximately 90 portraits is of Robert South S.T.P. by George Vertue (publisher in 1715 by Jonah Bowyer) followed by a portrait of John Tillotson Dean of Canterbury and Archibishop and James Bradley D.D. third astronomer royal (1692– 1762) and then Mrs. Griffith, Mrs. Charlotte Smith, John Bigland (schoolmaster turned author), Richard Chenevix Bishop of Waterford (1698-1779) and other 18th-century figures Included are portraits of Samuel Johnson, David Garrick, Mrs. Oldfield, Mrs. Lessingham, Mrs. Davenport, Madame Mara, Benjamin Franklin, Edmund Burke, and Lord Byron as well as other notable authors and playwrights. Toward the end is a portrait of Joseph Vernet (à la poupée); Grose the antiquarian and a vignette of an artist with a book “Sketches from nature”. The second volume with the spine label “Players” begins with a newspaper clipping “Anecdote of Garrick in the character of Lear” followed by pages from which prints have been removed but the volume contains approximately 50 prints (some with color) of the men and women of the London stage in the 18th and early 19th centuries, mostly in character.
724 810B
Acquired September 2021