Benjamin Smith
The Most Noble Charles Marquis Cornwallis…

Public Domain

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Artist Benjamin SmithEnglish, active 1802–1824

Afterafter John Singleton Copley American, 1738–1815

PublisherPublished by John BoydellEnglish, 1719–1804

CultureEnglish

Titles

The Most Noble Charles Marquis Cornwallis…

Date1798

Printed inLondon, England

MediumStipple engraving on wove paper

DimensionsPlate: 20 × 15 1/8 in. (50.8 × 38.4 cm)
Sheet: 21 1/2 × 16 1/2 in. (54.6 × 41.9 cm)

Credit LineThe Bayou Bend Collection, museum purchase funded by Jon Finger, Unal Baysal, Bass Wallace, Ross Spence, Kevin Lewis, Steven Cordill, and Louis Girard in honor of Jerry Finger and Mike McLanahan at "One Great Night in November, 2017"

Object numberB.2017.15

Not on view

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Department

Bayou Bend

Object Type

PRINTS

DescriptionThe leading portraitist of the pre-Revolutionary British colonies, John Singleton Copley, left Boston’s deteriorating political situation and fled to London to develop his career as a history painter. Copley gained international fame in London, where he lived for the rest of his life. Unique among his contemporaries, he painted both patriots and loyalists before and after leaving America. This stately portrait of General Cornwallis portrays the British officer in uniform with vignettes of his military career. Best known in the United States for surrendering to George Washington at Yorktown at the end of the American Revolution, Cornwallis went on to hold important military and colonial administrative positions.
Provenance[The Old Print Shop, Inc., New York], by 2017; purchased by MFAH, 2017.
Exhibition History"Radicals and Revolutionaries: America's Founding Fathers," Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, March 10–May 28, 2018.
Inscriptions, Signatures and Marks

Recto, printed in black ink below image, left: Painted by J. S. Copley, R. A.
Recto, printed in black ink below image, right: Engraved by Benj. Smith
Recto, printed in black ink below image, center: THE MOST NOBLE CHARLES MARQUIS CORNWALLIS, &c, &c,
Recto, printed "in black ink" (cursive) below image, center: Master General of the Ordnance/Lieut. General & General Governor of his Majesty’s Kingdom of Ireland / From the Original Picture in Guildhall, presented to the Corporation of London by Alderman Boydell / Pub. Sept. 1, 1798, by J. & J. Boydell, No. 90 Cheapside And at the Shakespeare Gallery, Pall Mall.

Recto: Inscribed in graphite, bottom left corner: 18
Recto: Inscribed in graphite, bottom left corner: 10
Recto: Inscribed in graphite, top left corner: 17
Verso: (Partially erased) Inscribed in graphite, bottom right: [10/6]
Verso: (Partially erased) Inscribed in ink, bottom right, within plate: [8] or [S]

Watermark: none noted

Catalogue raisonnéNone for this impression.

Cataloguing data may change with further research.

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