GERMAN SCHOOL, circa 1776
The Prince of Waldeck with Possibly Johann Heinrich Tischbein the Elder or Johann Friedrich August Tischbein Viewing The Death of General Wolfe by Benjamin West: A Pair of Drawings
one inscribed la mort Du/gen: Wolf/par West.
both stamped on the reverse with the collector’s mark of Mortimer Brandt
ink, pencil, and brown wash on paper
12 1/2 x 10 1/5 inches (317x 259 mm)
Sold to the William L. Clements Library, University of Michigan
PROVENANCE
Possibly Benjamin West’s estate sale, Henry J. and George Henry Robbins, London, June 20-22, 1829, lot 162
Mortimer Brandt, New York by 1963 - 1993, and thus by descent to
Private Collection, Baltimore until the present time
EXHIBITED
New York, Mortimer Brandt, 20 Drawings in Search of an Author, April 4-30, 1966 nos. 13 & 14, illustrated
LITERATURE
Helmut von Erffa & Allen Staley, The Paintings of Benjamin West, Yale University Press, New Haven and London, 1986, p214, no. 95, fn. 3.
The write up that Helmut von Erffa and Allen Staley did in their catalogue raisonné of Benjamin West on the 1776 painting of The Death of General Wolfe and its relationship to these drawings is as follows:
“The Prince of Waldeck travelled to England in the summer of 1775 and in the following April he agreed to provide a regiment of troops from Waldeck to fight on behalf of England in America. He must have commissioned [from Benjamin West The Death of General Wolfe] which apparently shows a scene of English military victory in America, during his visit. A letter in the archives of Waldeck, dated 3 Sept. 1776 From C. H. Hinuber (the Hanoverian minister in London) to the Prince’s private secretary, accompanying West’s receipt for £250, and asking if the Prince was pleased with the painting [survives].
The Prince apparently was pleased as he presented West a picture of himself showing [The Death of General Wolfe] to his principal historical painter. This painting may be reflected in either one of a pair of drawings owned by Mortimer Brandt in 1963, each of which shows two men examining a painting. One of them has an inscription on the stretcher of the picture within the drawing, la mort du gen. Wolf par West. The painter to whom the Prince showed [The Death of General Wolfe] was possibly either Johann Heinrich Tischbein the Elder (1722 – 1789) or Johann Friedrich August Tischbein (1750 – 1812), both of whom worked extensively for the Prince’s court at Arolsen.”
In 1966 Professor Von Effra first suggested, in Mortimer Brandt’s catalog, that this pair of drawings could be those sold in the artist’s estate sale held at his well-known house / gallery/ studio located at 14 Newman St, London on June 20 – 22, 1829, lot 162. The entry read “Portrait of the Prince of Waldeck, exhibiting Mr. West’s Wolfe to his principal Historical Painter, the Picture presented to the late Mr. West by the Prince”