Provenance

By descent from the sitter to his daughter, Frances, who married Sir William Boothby, 1st Baronet (1637–1707) in 1653;

Thence by descent in the Boothby family at Ashbourne Hall, Derbyshire and later Fonmon Castle, Vale of Glamorgan, to the present owner.

Note

This wonderfully sketchy and energetically handled portrait was almost certainly painted in Oxford and is most likely one of the portraits that remained unfinished when Dobson left the city in 1646. Painted with vigorous, rapidly applied brushwork, particularly in the hand and the armour, with a characterful likeness swiftly captured, Rogers (see Literature) suggested that it probably gives an idea of what the artist could achieve in a single sitting. With his hair plastered to his scalp and his gnarled hand tightly gripping the hilt of his sword, it is as if the sitter has just dismounted his horse and removed his helmet having ridden in from battle. There is an intensity and a sympathy in his eyes that speaks not of the glorious pomp of military pageantry, but the exhaustion and hardship of real combat.

The first native-born artist of real significance in Britain, whom his contemporary John Aubrey called ‘the most excellent painter that England hath yet bred’, little is known about Dobson’s life or career.1 Believed to have received encouragement from Van Dyck before his death in 1641, almost all the known works by this enigmatic painter were executed at Oxford, where the King and the Royal Court had moved following the outbreak of hostilities with Parliament. Dobson moved to the city early in 1643 in search of royal patronage. He probably received early commissions from the Prince of Wales and Prince Rupert; and an etched portrait of him by Josias English, produced circa 1650, as well as the title of a (now lost) poem dedicated to him by Thomas Rawlins, both suggest that he was appointed Sergeant-Painter to the King and a Groom of the Privy Chamber. The often unfinished condition of many of his pictures, as well as the deteriorating quality of the materials in some of his later portraits and the fact that only one preparatory drawing is attributed to him, are all indications of the exigencies of working in a besieged city, in the middle of a civil war at a time of extreme national strife. His premature death, shortly after the fall of Oxford in 1646, cut short a flourishing and highly original career. Not until the emergence of William Hogarth, over half a century later, would an indigenous artist of such prodigious talent emerge in England.

The simplicity and almost full-frontal stance of the composition are characteristic of the directness, individuality and personal force which characterise Dobson’s best portraits. The figure fills the canvas, lending a sense of immediacy and presence to the picture, whilst the metallic sheen of his armour leaves no question of the sitter’s status as a military commander. Meanwhile the red sash at his waist, only cursorily indicated at this early stage in production but which is such a prominent feature of so many of Dobson’s portraits of Royalist officers, is indicative of his loyalty to the King (fig. 1).

When this portrait was last exhibited it was catalogued as a portrait of an unknown officer. Having descended in the collection at Fonmon Castle for as long as anybody could remember, the sitter had historically been thought to be a member of the Jones family. However, Colonel Philip Jones of Fonmon (1618–1674), who acquired the Castle in 1656, served under Sir Thomas Fairfax in the Parliamentarian Army, acting as Parliamentary Governor of Swansea, which he successfully held against Royalist Forces, and was later comptroller of Oliver Cromwell's household. The previous owners of the Castle were the St. John family. They were also Roundheads, however, with Sir Anthony St. John, from whom Colonel Jones purchased the house, serving as a Captain in the Earl of Essex’s Regiment of Foot. So, he too would not have been at Oxford with the King when Dobson was working in the city.

Since its last publication in the early 1980s, however, it has been plausibly suggested that the sitter is Colonel John Milward (1599–1670), who declared for the King in 1643. His daughter, Frances Milward, married Sir William Boothby, 1st Bt., in 1653. In 1917 his descendant, Sir Seymour Boothby, 13th Bt. (1866–1951), inherited Fonmon Castle by marriage and Fonmon has been the seat of the Boothby Baronets ever since.

Colonel John Milward, of Snitterton, served as Sheriff for the county of Derbyshire from 1635–37 and captain of militia from 1635–42. An active Royalist, he was appointed to the Commission of Array in 1642 and was commissioned by the Earl of Newcastle to raise his own regiment of Foot with the rank of Colonel in 1643. He is also recorded as commanding a regiment of Dragoons (mounted infantry). He fought at Marston Moor, on 2 July 1644, but afterwards laid down his arms and compounded on a fine of £1,000 for ‘delinquency’ in supporting the King. He was shown leniency as it was noted in his favour that he had restrained his troops from looting when passing through Parliamentary areas. After the Restoration Milward served as Member of Parliament for Derbyshire from 1665 until his death in 1670. A diary that he kept of his time in the Commons is now held in the British Museum. In his obituary, a local poet described him as a kind landlord, a good neighbour, and a careful father.

We are grateful to Dr Malcom Rogers and Dr Andrew Cormack for their assistance in the cataloguing of this lot. We are particularly grateful to Adrian Woodhouse, who first identified the sitter in this portrait, for pointing out that Milward’s features here bear a close likeness to the carved effigy on his monument, erected in the late 1660s, in his parish church, St Helen’s, Darley Dale, in Derbyshire.