December 10-13, 2024 Firearms & Militaria
This lot is closed for bidding. Bidding ended on 12/10/2024
Oil on canvas, 30 x 25 in.; within gilt, contemporary frame.
Robert Wilson (1775-1844) of Lancaster, Ohio began military service during the War of 1812 as a sergeant of volunteer horse. A successful merchant and landowner, he continued to serve in the Ohio Militia, eventually reaching the rank of colonel. This circa 1838 portrait of the handsome officer shows him wearing what appears to be the uniform worn by his troop during and following the war, which was inspired by that adopted by the elite 1st City Troop of Philadelphia in 1810, whose smart dress was an inspiration to many aspiring militia cavalry units. His Federal era, steel- or silver-hilted, reversed-P guard saber with silver cord swordknot is an American copy of the P1796 light dragoon saber of the British Army.
The artist, Milton William Hopkins (1775-1844), was a portrait, sign, and ornamental painter and teacher of drawing and painting, active in Ohio from about 1835 until his death in 1844. Born in Harwinton, Connecticut, August 1, 1789, he moved in 1823 to the canal town of Albion, New York, where for a dozen years he conducted a series of small businesses, including sign painting, chair making, and canal-boating. He was active in temperance, antislavery, and church activities, but little is known of his artistic career before 1828, when he paid an extended visit to Richmond, Virginia where he advertised a 36-hour course for ladies in "Poonah" or theorem painting. During the early 1830s, Hopkins was back in Albion, where he first began to advertise as a portrait painter under the name 'M. W. Hopkins', which professional name he used for the remainder of his life.
With his wife and ten children he relocated to Ohio, working briefly in the Cleveland area, then purchasing a farm in Williamsburg, east of Cincinnati. He painted several portraits in Lancaster in 1838 and in 1839-1840 operated a "Portrait Gallery" in Columbus. In 1841, he traveled to the South and was engaged in Jackson, Mississippi on several commissions, when he was beset by a mob "ripe for blood", having heard rumors of his antislavery activities. After a narrow escape, he returned to family in Ohio and was painting likenesses in Chillicothe in 1842 and Cincinnati the following year. He died of pneumonia on 24 April 1844, while on a visit to his Williamsburg farm.
Hopkins' portrait style relates closely to that of Ammi Phillips (1788-1865), with whom he may have been acquainted early in his career. Phillips and Hopkins, born one year apart, came from adjacent towns in Litchfield County, Connecticut and they both worked in nearby towns in upstate New York. Hopkins frequently painted his subjects with clearly defined facial features, prominent ears, highlighted pupils and square, blunt fingernails, against a muted brown background.