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WD4424
- Record Id:
- 040-003281517
- Hierarchy Root Ancestor Record Id:
- 032-003281506
- MDARK:
- ark:/81055/vdc_100028181659.0x002e98
- LARK:
- SLARK:
- Format:
- ISAD(G)
- Reference (shelfmark):
- WD4424
- Title:
-
Half-length portrait of James Morris, wearing a black frock-coat with black velvet collar, carrying a cane in his right hand and top hat in his left.
Inscribed: 'C.Grant Calcutta. June 6th 1838'. Artist(s): Grant, Colesworthy (1813-1880)
- Scope & Content:
-
Half-length portrait of James Morris, wearing a black frock-coat with black velvet collar, carrying a cane in his right hand and top hat in his left.
Inscribed: ‘C. Grant Calcutta. June 6th 1838.’
Inscribed on reverse: ‘James (Fitzroy) Morris. asst Secretary to the Municipal committee. June 1838.’ The original frame has an untidy overwritten inscription reading: ‘James Morris afterwards James Fitzroy Morris son of James Morris of Calcutta, Merchant. Nephew of Mrs Chester Woodroffe. This young man went out in the Indian Gratton at about the age of 15. Signed C. Grant, Calcutta, June 6th 1838,’ with some further illegible words.
Water-colour; 20.7 by 16 cm.
Purchased 1995.
Note: Not published in ‘Sketches of the Public Characters of Calcutta’, Calcutta, [1850]. The Bengal Directory for 1838 lists ‘J.F. Morris. Asst. Secretary to the Fever Hospital’ and ‘J. Morris Junior Secretary to the Committee of the Fever Hospital.’ This must refer to the hospital replaced by the Medical College Hospital in College Street, started in 1848, with the aid of funds from the Lottery Committee.
James Morris was born in Calcutta in June 1813, his father, also James, having married Charlotte Elizabeth Fitzroy there in July 1810. The inscriber of the frame seems to have confused father and son and may also have confused the name of the ship. There was no East Indiaman named the ‘Gratton’ but one named the ‘Gatton’, which sailed between 1771-1779, and two named the ‘Glatton’, the first sailing from 1777 to 1786 and the second from 1792 to 1813. If the inscription is correct in suggesting that James arrived in India as a boy, it must have been the elder, and it is possible he jumped ship, although almost all the voyages made by the Glatton were to China.
- Collection Area:
- Visual Arts
- Hierarchy Record Ids:
- 032-003281506
040-003281517 - Is part of:
- WD3-10, WD1602, WD4424 : GRANT, COLESWORTHY (1813-1880) Colesworthy Grant went to India in 1832 and lived with his elder brother, George, a…
WD4424 : Half-length portrait of James Morris, wearing a black frock-coat with black velvet collar, carrying a cane in his right hand and top hat… - Hierarchy:
- 032-003281506[0016]/040-003281517
- Container:
- View / search within Archive / Collection: WD3-10, WD1602, WD4424
- Record Type (Level):
- File
- Extent:
- 1 Item
- Digitised Content:
- Languages:
- Not applicable
- Scripts:
- Not applicable
- Styles:
- British school
European school - Start Date:
- 1838
- End Date:
- 1838
- Date Range:
- 1838
- Era:
- CE
- Access:
- Restrictions to access apply please consult British Library staff
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- User Conditions:
- Appointment required to view these records. Please consult Asian and African Studies Print Room staff.
- Physical Characteristics:
-
Medium: watercolour
- Material Type:
- Prints, Drawings and Paintings
- Legal Status:
- Not Public Record(s)
- Names:
- Grant, Colesworthey, artist, writer and animal rights activist, 1813-1880
Morris, James - Subjects:
- Portraits