SIR JOSHUA REYNOLDS, P.R.A ( 1723- 1792) KADY MARGARET BEAUMONT

HALF-LENGTH in oval, nearly full face turned to left, black dress, white muslin around the neck with a blue ribbon.

  Margaret,  daughter of  John Willes of Astrop, Northampton,  and granddaughter of Lord Chief Justice Willes.  Married, May 6, 1778,  Sir George Howland Beaumont, seven Bart., died in the year 1829.
  This portrait was painted in 1779 or 1780, and is mentioned in Leslie & Taylor's book on Reynolds,  where it is said: " Some of his most charming female heads are of this period, as Lady Beaumont, the beautiful wife of his friend Sir George. " Lord Ronald Sutherland Gower,  F.S.A., says in part in his book on Sir Joshua, p. 86: " Two beautiful  ladies' portraits by Reynolds belong to this year, that of Lady Beaumont, wife of the artistic Basonet, and that of Mrs. Payne Galway."  Sir Walter Armstrong,  in his work on Reynolds,  p.118, also mentions this portrait,  and that of Sir George Beaumont in his Index, p.193, and speaks of Lady Beaumont's portrait as being exhibited in 1780 the year that saw the transfer of the Academy  Exhibition to its new home in Somerset House.
  It was engraved by J.R. Smith in 1780, and by S.W. Reynolds,  later.
  Besides being seen at the Royal Academy in 1780, it was exhibited at the British Institute in 1813, and in 1858. In 1867 it was in the National Portrait Exhibition,  and in the Grosvenor Gallery in 1884.
  The picture comes from the family.
  " The lady was famed for the exquisite courtesy and tact with which she dispensed her husband's liberal hospitality establishment to artists and for the genuine kindness which, carrying out his chief  aim, she was wont to extend to the younger and less firmly established members of the fraternity "‐ Claude Phillips.

       95

LN