John Smart, Portrait of Edward Manning, Captain of the Pitt, January 1796

Chicago:

Maggie Keenan, “John Smart, Portrait of Edward Manning, Captain of the Pitt, January 1796,” catalogue entry in Aimee Marcereau DeGalan, Blythe Sobol, and Maggie Keenan, The Starr Collection of Portrait Miniatures, 1500–1850: The Collections of the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, vol. 4, ed. Aimee Marcereau DeGalan (Kansas City, MO: Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, 2025), https://doi.org/10.37764/8322.5.1606.

MLA:

Keenan, Maggie. “John Smart, Portrait of Edward Manning, Captain of the Pitt, January 1796,” catalogue entry. Aimee Marcereau DeGalan, Blythe Sobol, and Maggie Keenan. The Starr Collection of Portrait Miniatures, 1500–1850: The Collections of the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, edited by Aimee Marcereau DeGalan, vol. 4, Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, 2025. doi: 10.37764/8322.5.1606.

See the artist’s biography in volume 4.

This work by John Smart illustrates one of the earliest-known examples of an individual depicted in an Honourable East India Company (HEIC) naval uniform.¹ The full-dress uniform consists of gilt frogging, black velvet lapels, and gold buttons emblazoned with anchors, all of which Smart captures in the most minute detail. Provenance research into this miniature provided additional information: a 1957 sales catalogue at the University of Missouri-Kansas City Miller Nichols Library includes an “X” next to the lot titled “Portrait of Admiral [sic] Manning by John Smart, signed with initials and dated 1796,” an annotation likely made by Martha Jane Starr.² This “Portrait of Admiral Manning” was also located in an earlier catalogue for an auction of works belonging to Edmund Dubois Cavell in 1942.³ Cavell was the great-grandnephew of Captain Edward Manning (1747–1798) of the HEIC, compelling evidence of this sitter’s true identity.⁴

Captain Manning traveled around the world, overseeing trade to China as captain of the Pitt from 1788 to 1790.⁵ After Manning’s homecoming, he married Jane Pears, and they enjoyed a year-long honeymoon before his return to sea.⁶ In 1791, the Pitt was repurposed to transport convicts to Australia. Manning detailed the journey in a letter that described intense storms, a fever that killed dozens aboard, smallpox, scurvy, and fugitives:

I am sorry to tell you that I have lost four of the convicts. I was under the necessity of permitting them to go on shore with the boats, from whence they did, or at least attempted to make their escape. I rather think they were drowned in making the attempt, or if not; they must have been secreted in a Convent of the Friars. . . . I wish I could have recovered the convicts; though perhaps I am more to blame than they were. I was essentially obliged for their assistance in the moment of distress, and so situated, who could refuse their going on shore?⁷

Of the 352 male and fifty-eight female convicts, twenty-nine died on the voyage, and five escaped.⁸

Manning made one final journey to Bengal, India, from 1794 to 1795.⁹ This 1796 portrait celebrated Manning’s tenure as captain of the Pitt and probably marked his retirement.¹⁰ Smart captures Manning’s sun-kissed skin, ruddy from months or years at sea. The miniature was likely painted in January of 1796, as Manning’s wife died in February of that year, and he would not have had reason to commission a miniature while in mourning. Edward Manning died two years after his wife, in June 1798.¹¹ His legacy lives on in this re-identified miniature, in his surviving letters, and in the “Manning Strait,” named in his honor as the first European to sail through the passage of water connecting New Georgia Sound to the Pacific Ocean.¹²

Notes

1. For the earliest example, see Mather Brown, A Commander in the East India Company, 1786, oil on canvas, 36 x 28 in. (91.4 x 71.1 cm), Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, 54.147, https://collections.mfa.org/objects/33516/a-commander-in-the-east-india-company. See also Spoilum, Portrait of a Captain of the British East India Company, n.d., oil and gold paint on canvas, 16 1/2 x 13 1/4 in. (40.8 x 33.6 cm), sold at Christie’s, London, “China Trade Paintings,” November 7, 2019, lot 18, https://www.christies.com/en/lot/lot-6231095; Adam Buck, Portrait of Captain Rait in the Uniform of the East India Company, 1800, pencil, black chalk, and watercolor, 15 7/8 x 11 7/8 in. (40.5 x 30.2 cm), sold at Christie’s, London, “The 10th Anniversary Irish Sale,” May 12, 2006, lot 22, https://www.christies.com/en/lot/lot-4704763; Stephen Hewson, Portrait of an East India Company Captain, ca. 1800, 29 15/16 x 25 in. (76 x 63.5 cm), National Maritime Museum, Greenwich, https://www.rmg.co.uk/collections/objects/rmgc-object-14600; William Armfield Hobday, William Hay, 1815, 29 15/16 x 25 in. (76 x 63.5 cm), National Maritime Museum, Greenwich, https://www.rmg.co.uk/collections/objects/rmgc-object-14231.

2. Catalogue of Objects of Art and Vertu, Sotheby’s, London, May 7, 1957, lot 60. The lot description aligns with the Nelson-Atkins miniature: “Portrait of Admiral [sic] Manning by John Smart, signed with initials and dated 1796, three-quarter face to the right, wearing blue coat, the black collar with gilt frogging and buttons, with white cravat and powdered hair—oval—3 1/4 in. high—gold frame.” The Starrs donated their archive to the Miller Nichols Library in 2010; see “Martha Jane Starr Collection,” University of Missouri-Kansas City Libraries, accessed July 23, 2024, https://digital.library.umkc.edu/node/30948.

3. Catalogue of Fine Modern Jewels, Miniatures and Objects of Vertu, Sotheby’s, London, July 16, 1942, lot 72.

4. According to the Sotheby’s July 16, 1942, lot description (see n. 3): “Admiral [sic] Manning was great-uncle of Elizabeth Manning, daughter of Alderman Manning.” Elizabeth’s son was Edmund D. Cavell, making Captain Manning his great grandnephew. “Admiral” was not a term the HEIC used; it was reserved for the Royal Navy. My suspicions that this portrait depicted Captain Manning were confirmed by Arthur Jaffé’s research, whose archive included a photograph of the present work with the inscription: “Sotheby July 16 1942 Called ‘Admiral Manning’ probably Capt. Edward Manning of the H.E.I Co. Commanding Pitt.” His archive was posthumously acquired by the miniaturist scholar Daphne Foskett. Thanks to my colleagues’ 2019 research trip to visit Foskett’s archives in Edinburgh; notes in NAMA curatorial files.

5. Charles Hardy, A Register of Ships, Employed in the Service of the Honorable The United East India Company, From the Year 1760 to 1810 (London: W. Heseltine, 1811), 92. Manning was first aboard the East Indiaman Ceres, which traded along the Coromandel Coast and China between 1782 and 1784. He was also on the Earl Talbot from 1785 to 1787. “British Merchant East Indiaman ‘Ceres’ (1773),” Three Decks, accessed May 8, 2024, https://threedecks.org/index.php?display_type=show_ship&id=29182. Their voyage from China to England is immortalized in a newspaper article: “A beautiful young male Tyger, about ten or twelve months old, nearly the size of a large mastiff dog, is now on board the Pitt East Indiaman, Captain Manning, just arrived in the river from China.” The article proceeds to detail the animal’s playful nature, sleeping in sailors’ hammocks, and stealing shoes and raw meat: “as the tyger it has been observed, prefers raw meat to either boiled or roasted.” Derby Mercury, September 2, 1790, 3.

6. They married on September 9, 1790; London Church of England Parish Registers, ref. P69/DIO/A/01/MS 17605/1, London Metropolitan Archives. Another source states, “Edward Manning, esq. commander of the Pitt Indiaman, to miss Pears, of Carlisle”; “Marriages and Deaths,” Lady’s Magazine or Entertaining Companion for the Fair Sex 21 (January 1790): 561.

7. London Chronicle, January 3–5, 1792, 10.

8. Additionally, those who died included seven seamen, thirteen soldiers, five soldiers’ wives, five soldiers’ children, and two convicts’ children; London Chronicle, January 3–5, 1792, 10. One of the escapees, Thomas Watling (Scottish, b. 1762), was an artist who was initially arrested for forgery. He was recaptured by Dutch authorities and sent to Sydney, where he was later pardoned and pursued a career painting the earliest colonial pictures of Australia. Rex Rienits, “Thomas Watling (1762–?),” Australian Dictionary of Biography 2, online edition (Melbourne: Melbourne University Press, 1967), accessed May 2, 2024, https://adb.anu.edu.au/biography/watling-thomas-2776.

9. Like Manning, Smart had just returned to England from India in 1795. He had painted countless individuals involved with the HEIC, so his connection with Manning may have been made during his time abroad.

10. Captain John Gerrard replaced Manning as Captain of the Pitt at the end of 1795. See “British Merchant East Indiaman ‘Fortitude’ (1782),” Three Decks, accessed July 3, 2024, https://threedecks.org/index.php?display_type=show_ship&id=29715.

11. “Of an apoplexy, at the house of Mr. Blackmore, Belgrave Place, Pimlico, Edward Manning, Esq. late Captain of the Pitt Indiaman,” Jackson’s Oxford Journal, June 30, 1798, 4. Manning was buried on June 28, 1798; London Church of England Parish Registers, ref. P69/And2/A/010/Ms06673/013, London Metropolitan Archives.

12. H. B. Guppy, The Solomon Islands and Their Natives (London: Swan Sonnenschein, Lowrey and Co., 1887), 266.

Probably commissioned by the sitter, Captain Edward Manning (1747–1798), London, January 1796–1798;

Inherited by his brother [1];

By descent to his son, Alderman Manning (ca. 1765–1848), Dedham, Essex, England, by 1798–1848;

By descent to his daughter, Elizabeth Cavell (née Manning, 1826–1894), Suffolk, England, 1848–1894;

By descent to her son, Edmund Dubois Cavell (1862–1945), Suffolk, England, 1894–1942;

Purchased at his sale, Fine Modern Jewels, Miniatures, and Objects of Vertu, Sotheby’s, London, July 16, 1942, lot 72, as Admiral Manning, by Guerault, 1942 [2];

H. Russell Esq., C.B.E., by 1957;

Sold at his sale, Objects of Art and Vertu, Sotheby’s, London, May 7, 1957, lot 60, as Portrait of Admiral Manning [3];

Mr. John W. (1905–2000) and Mrs. Martha Jane (1906–2011) Starr, Kansas City, MO, by 1965;

Their gift to the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, MO, 1965.

Notes

[1] While n. 2 indicates that Captain Manning was the “great-uncle of Elizabeth Manning, daughter of Alderman Manning,” any information surrounding Captain Manning’s brother, and Alderman’s father, has not yet been located.

[2] According to the lot description, “A fine miniature of Admiral Manning by John Smart, signed and dated 1796, three-quarters dexter, gaze directed at spectator, hair en queue, in white cravat and blue coat, with black collar decorated with gold braid, against a grey background, oval, 3 1/4 in.; leather case. Admiral Manning was great-uncle of Elizabeth Manning, daughter of Alderman Manning, M.F.H. of Lower Park, Dedham, Essex, a relation of the famous Cardinal of that name and ancestor of Nurse Cavell on her mother’s side.” See the previous lot: “A miniature of Humphrey Cavell, an ancestor of Nurse Cavell.” According to Art Prices Current 20 (1941–1942), Guerault bought lot 72 for 38 pounds.

This is almost certainly Danton Guérault, Esq., recorded in probate as “Pierre Henri Danton Guerault-Froc,” who collected a variety of portrait miniatures. He donated several to the Victoria and Albert Museum in 1927. Guérault is described as an art dealer in “Miniatures from Spain? Story of Barcelona Escapes,” The Scotsman (Midlothian, Scotland), August 6, 1938, 16. His posthumous sale (Christie, Manson, and Woods, London, June 23, 1954, lots 124–25) included a collection of books about famous miniature painters. Guérault died on April 15, 1954, at Hammersmith Hospital, London.

[3] According to the lot description, “Portrait of Admiral Manning by John Smart, signed with initials and dated 1796, three-quarter face to the right, wearing blue coat, the black collar with gilt frogging and buttons, with white cravat and powdered hair—oval—3 1/4in. high—gold frame.” An anontated sales catalogue is located at the University of Missouri-Kansas City Miller Nichols Library and is likely annotated by Mr. or Mrs. Starr with an “X” next to the lot number.

John Smart—Miniaturist: 1741/2–1811, The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, MO, December 9, 1965–January 2, 1966, no cat., as Gentleman.

John Smart: Virtuoso in Miniature, The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, MO, December 21, 2024–January 4, 2026, no cat., as Portrait of Edward Manning, Captain of the Pitt.

Catalogue of Fine Modern Jewels, Miniatures and Objects of Vertu (London: Sotheby’s, July 16, 1942), 11.

“Forthcoming Sales,” Burlington Magazine 99, no. 650 (May 1957): 172.

Catalogue of Objects of Art and Vertu (London: Sotheby’s, May 7, 1957), 13.

Daphne Foskett, John Smart: The Man and His Miniatures (London: Cory, Adams, and Mackay, 1964), 70.