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Lot Essay
NAPOLEON'S NEW LONGWOOD DESK
A desk of this 'antique' Grecian form, with raised Grecian 'altar' pedestals and Egyptian lotus-flowered brackets, was amongst the furniture featured in the Library ground plan executed in 1815 by George Bullock (d. 1818) for 'General Buonaparte's cottage' at New Longwood, on the island of St. Helena, and carried out under the direction of George, Prince Regent, later King George IV (Bullock's ground plan, together with one of two related desks in mahogany, was illustrated in Christie's sale catalogue of Important English Furniture, 4 July 2002, lot 150 [the desk sold for £182,650]).
Reflecting Napoleon Bonaparte's military status as a General (rather than as Emperor), much of Bullock's St Helena furnishings reflected his style 'of pure and simple elegance', and were crafted in 'exquisitely veined British oak, polished in the highest degree'. Rudolph Ackermann referred to the 'tasteful simplicity' of Bullock's furniture in The Repository of Arts; and a 'library table' was noted as being 'particularly elegant and ... suited to every convenience of study and accomodation', in The Times, 25 October, 1815 (p. 66, fig. 49). Its form, with Grecian altar-stepped pedestals, well suited the architecture of New Longwood, which was designed 'in the pure simplicity of the Grecian style' by William Atkinson (d. 1839).
One such mahogany 'Library table', executed in black-inlaid mahogany, was invoiced in 1816, and described as having 'cupboards at each end for Portofolio's and Drawers', and was later amongst the furniture acquired in 1823 by Lt.-Gen. Sir Hudson Lowe, K.C.B.
THE DRUMLANRIG OAKS
It seems possible that the source for the oak for the present library-table may have derived from trees planted by the ancient family of Scott of Buccleuch and purchased by Bullock following the death of Henry Montagu-Douglas-Scott, 3rd Duke of Buccleuch and 5th Duke of Queensberry (d. 1812). The author and antiquarian Sir Walter Scott recorded the history of Bullock noting in Drumlanrig Castle's 'old and noble park ... certain very old oaks, which had grown for ages, and had at length become stag-headed and half-dead ... [He] had no hesitation in giving it as his opinion that the progress of the years had exactly brought these ancient oaks to the point of perfection when their timber would make the most excellent furniture'. In his Reliquiae Trottcosienses, 18, Scott referred to his greatly prized set of 'Imperial' extending dining-tables supplied by Bullock for Abbotsford:- 'the beautiful dining-table of Scottish oak ... [is] clouded in the most beautiful style' (A. Coleridge, 'The Work of George Bullock, cabinet-maker, in Scotland: II', Connoisseur, May 1965, pp. 16 and 17).
THE PROVENANCE
The desk may have been supplied to James Archibald Stuart-Wortley-Mackenzie (1747-1818), 2nd son of Baroness Mount Stuart of Wortley (d. 1794). In 1736 the Baroness had married John Stuart, 3rd Earl of Bute, and following her death, the Barony of Mount Stuart passed to the eldest son. However, James Archibald, as second male heir, succeeded in 1803 to the Scottish estates of his uncle, Rt. Hon. James Stuart Mackenzie and it may have been this event which inspired him to commission a desk of Bullock's fashionable design in Scottish oak.
A desk of this 'antique' Grecian form, with raised Grecian 'altar' pedestals and Egyptian lotus-flowered brackets, was amongst the furniture featured in the Library ground plan executed in 1815 by George Bullock (d. 1818) for 'General Buonaparte's cottage' at New Longwood, on the island of St. Helena, and carried out under the direction of George, Prince Regent, later King George IV (Bullock's ground plan, together with one of two related desks in mahogany, was illustrated in Christie's sale catalogue of Important English Furniture, 4 July 2002, lot 150 [the desk sold for £182,650]).
Reflecting Napoleon Bonaparte's military status as a General (rather than as Emperor), much of Bullock's St Helena furnishings reflected his style 'of pure and simple elegance', and were crafted in 'exquisitely veined British oak, polished in the highest degree'. Rudolph Ackermann referred to the 'tasteful simplicity' of Bullock's furniture in The Repository of Arts; and a 'library table' was noted as being 'particularly elegant and ... suited to every convenience of study and accomodation', in The Times, 25 October, 1815 (p. 66, fig. 49). Its form, with Grecian altar-stepped pedestals, well suited the architecture of New Longwood, which was designed 'in the pure simplicity of the Grecian style' by William Atkinson (d. 1839).
One such mahogany 'Library table', executed in black-inlaid mahogany, was invoiced in 1816, and described as having 'cupboards at each end for Portofolio's and Drawers', and was later amongst the furniture acquired in 1823 by Lt.-Gen. Sir Hudson Lowe, K.C.B.
THE DRUMLANRIG OAKS
It seems possible that the source for the oak for the present library-table may have derived from trees planted by the ancient family of Scott of Buccleuch and purchased by Bullock following the death of Henry Montagu-Douglas-Scott, 3rd Duke of Buccleuch and 5th Duke of Queensberry (d. 1812). The author and antiquarian Sir Walter Scott recorded the history of Bullock noting in Drumlanrig Castle's 'old and noble park ... certain very old oaks, which had grown for ages, and had at length become stag-headed and half-dead ... [He] had no hesitation in giving it as his opinion that the progress of the years had exactly brought these ancient oaks to the point of perfection when their timber would make the most excellent furniture'. In his Reliquiae Trottcosienses, 18, Scott referred to his greatly prized set of 'Imperial' extending dining-tables supplied by Bullock for Abbotsford:- 'the beautiful dining-table of Scottish oak ... [is] clouded in the most beautiful style' (A. Coleridge, 'The Work of George Bullock, cabinet-maker, in Scotland: II', Connoisseur, May 1965, pp. 16 and 17).
THE PROVENANCE
The desk may have been supplied to James Archibald Stuart-Wortley-Mackenzie (1747-1818), 2nd son of Baroness Mount Stuart of Wortley (d. 1794). In 1736 the Baroness had married John Stuart, 3rd Earl of Bute, and following her death, the Barony of Mount Stuart passed to the eldest son. However, James Archibald, as second male heir, succeeded in 1803 to the Scottish estates of his uncle, Rt. Hon. James Stuart Mackenzie and it may have been this event which inspired him to commission a desk of Bullock's fashionable design in Scottish oak.