A SET OF SIX GEORGE I UPRIGHT JOINED PANELS

CIRCA 1721-24

细节

A SET OF SIX GEORGE I UPRIGHT JOINED PANELS
Circa 1721-24
Of ivory wool, worked in colored crewel or wools with a number of recurring motifs of a Roman Emperor's cameo style portrait wearing a laurel leaf wreath of victory, in an oval medallion, supported by a crowned lion and a unicorn; a Chinese blue and white porcelain lidded jar; a pheasant; a parrot perched on the bent bamboo handle of a blue and white Chinese porcelain vessel, filled with fruit, resting on a Chinese low stool; and festoons of flowers suspended from sconces, one panel monogrammed ES, for Elizabeth Steward, another worked with coat of arms, framed
66 x 14in. (165 x 35cm.); 64 x 14in. (160 x 35cm.); 60½ x 14½in. (151 x 36cm.); 60½ x 14½in. (151 x 36cm.); 56 x 14in. (140 x 35cm.); 36 x 10in. (90 x 25cm.), the panels (6)

来源

Commissioned by Elizabeth, eldest daughter and coheir of Elmes Steward of Pateshull and Cotterstock, Northampton and Thomas Guillim of Whitchurch, Hereford at Cotterstock, following their marriage on 5 August 1721.
By descent to their son Thomas Guillim, A.D.C. to General Wolfe.
By descent to his daughter and heiress Elizabeth Posthuma, who married in 1782 Lieut. General John Graves Simcoe (1752-1806), M.P. for St. Mawes, First Governor of Upper Canada and virtual founder of Toronto.
Possibly removed to the family home at Wolford House, Honiton, Devon.

出版

A.F. Kendrick, 'Some Embroideries in the Collection of Sir Frederick Richmond, Bt.', The Connoisseur, 1935, p.287.

拍品专文

The embroidered coat-of-arms show Thomas Guillim's arms impaling those of his wife, Elizabeth. The panels must have been made within the first three years of their marriage as Elizabeth became a heraldic heiress upon the death of her father in 1724; thereafter her arms would have been placed on an escutcheon of pretence in the center of her husband's arms as appropriate for an heraldic heiress.

These hangings may have accompanied the Simcoes to Toronto in 1793 for they furnished Government House with their possessions. Mrs. Simcoe wrote in her diary 'and we're hung up the tapestries in it which came from Stowe'. Alternatively, they may have remained at Old Court, Whitchurch, Herefordshire which was let in the late 18th century. Heath wrote, in 1799, that 'the manor house had long been let to a private family. Part of the ancient tapestry remained to ornament the walls of the bed-chambers, and the oak floors vied with the mirrors for lustre' (Collections towards the History and Antiquities of the County of Hereford, 1913, p. 167).

The impressive memorial to General Simcoe in the South Chancel of Exeter Cathedral is supported by a North American Indian and a soldier in mourning and incised '...the virtues of the Hero, the Patriot and the Christian were so emminently conspicuous...' He is buried in the grounds of the family chapel at Wolford, near Honiton. Wolford Chapel is maintained in perpetuity by the Ontario Heritage Foundation as a place of pilgrimage.

The panels would have descended through the Simcoe family and were presumably removed to the family's home at Wolford Lodge, Honiton in the 19th century. The contents of Wolford Lodge were sold in a house sale conducted by Messrs. Rippon Boswell & Co., Exeter, 15-16 August 1922 but these panels do not appear to be included in the sale catalogue.