Shaftesbury, or Lost and Found

A sketch for the larger (18 ½ x 16in.) picture in the Museum of London ('This painting shows a young Shoeblack, shoe cleaner and a street urchin outside the shop of print seller Henry Graves at 6 Pall Mall. The elder boy wears the uniform of the London Shoeblack Brigade, founded by John MacGregor and Lord Shaftesbury in 1851. He is pointing at a portrait of Shaftesbury, and is perhaps recruiting the younger boy into the safety of the Brigade. Shoeblacks, like chimney sweeps, were a worry to respectable Victorians because of their extreme youth.The Brigade aimed to regulate the way shoeblacks made a living by giving them uniforms, equipment and regular street pitches. It also encouraged church attendance and moral instruction.' www.museumoflondon.org.uk).

Christopher Wood identified two of the prints in the shop window: 'To the left of [Lord Shaftesbury's] portrait is a print of Millais' Order of Release and below it one of Faed's Mitherless Bairn. The paper on the ground is a notice of a meeting at Exeter Hall of the Ragged School Union, of which Lord Shaftesbury was President for 39 years.' (C. Wood, Victorian Panorama: Paintings of Victorian Life, London, 1976, no.67).