Studio RT Ltd

Description

We are offering for sale this very well executed portrait dating to the early 19th Century, by an unknown artist. The painting is a waist length portrait of a Scottish gentleman named Samuel Swinton in his later years. He is wearing a navy blue coat and stock and has a white high collared shirt. His quizzing glass, which was hung around his neck, is visible at the bottom of the painting.

Samuel Swinton was born on the 2nd August, 1773 to his father, a Captain in the Royal Navy also by the name of Samuel Swinton and his mother Felicite Jeanne Le Febre. An interesting anecdote about Captain Swinton is that apparently Baroness Orczy, when writing her book The Scarlet Pimpernel, loosely based the exploits of Sir Percy Blakeney on the doings of Captain Swinton when in Paris during the French Revolution, as he helped several members of the nobility to escape.

The younger Samuel was in the service of the Honourable East India Company. He married Isabella nee Routledge in 1800, and they had three sons and 6 daughters, although the first died in infancy. After retiring from the East India Company, he purchased the estate of Swinton, near Duns, in Berwickshire in 1829.

All three of his sons, George Melville, John Monckton and Samuel Charles, died without issue, and are commemorated in Swinton Church. Therefore, his daughter Anne Elizabeth Swinton became heiress of Swinton. She married in 1819 in Calcutta, George Swinton FRSE and they had a son William Bentinck Swinton 1835-1876. Another of his daughters Elizabeth Charlotte who was born on 4th September 1810 in Calcutta West Bengall, died in 1889 at 15 Oxford Terrace, Hyde Park. Samuel's line died out in the third quarter of the 20th Century.

Samuel himself died on 24th April, 1839, whilst his wife Isabella lived another 20 years and died in 1859 aged 89. His details appear in The Peerage, The Douglas archives and the Swetenham family tree.

This portrait may have been in the possession of Lady Inverclyde at some stage, as there is one of her 'At Home' cards stapled to the back of the frame.

The painting is framed in what is probably its original ornate gilt frame and slips. It will be supplied with new brass hangers, new brass picture wire and will be ready to hang.

Image size: 9 3/8 x 7 3/8 inches - 23.8cm x 18.75cm

Frame size: 15 1/4 x 13 1/4 inches - 38.6cm x 33.6cm

Medium: Oils on canvas

Condition: Very good. The surface is clean and there are no visible repairs. The canvas has been historically relined and there is some craquelure. The frame is in very good condition for its age with no losses.