John Smart, Portrait of Horatio Townsend, 1800

Chicago:

Maggie Keenan, “John Smart, Portrait of Horatio Townsend, 1800,” 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/10.37764/8322.5.1616.

MLA:

Keenan, Maggie. “John Smart, Portrait of Horatio Townsend, 1800,” 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: 10.37764/8322.5.1616.

See the artist’s biography in volume 4.

Horatio, or Horace, Townsend (1768–1824) was the eldest son of the Reverend Edward-Synge and Elizabeth Townsend of Bridgemount, County Cork, Ireland.¹ He graduated from Trinity College at the University of Dublin in 1790, received his doctor of law degree, and worked thereafter as a London barrister.² John Smart painted the thirty-two-year-old lawyer in formal attire; he wears a white vest and cravat paired with a navy jacket and a black, possibly velvet, collar. Townsend married Elizabeth Trelawney Townsend (1775–1855), likely a distant relative, on December 5, 1799, shortly before this portrait was painted.³ Smart already had a working relationship with the Townsend family: he had painted Elizabeth Trelawney Townsend as a child in 1784 and her mother in 1772 and 1765.⁴

Smart’s relationship with the family extended to his son John Smart Junior (1777–1809), who copied Smart’s portrait of Horatio Townsend not once, but twice.⁵ The first copy is signed and dated “J.S. Jun / 1801” (Fig. 1), and the second dates to three years later, in 1804. Smart Senior’s portrait is the most closely cropped of the three versions; otherwise, they share all the same features, including the two loose strands of hair that curve toward each other at the top left of Townsend’s forehead. While the present miniature was most likely a marriage portrait, Smart Junior’s two copies could have been gifts to Townsend’s parents.

Horatio Townsend died in Cork on January 17, 1824, and his portrait miniature eventually passed to his son, Lieutenant John Townsend (1815–1884).⁶ Lieutenant Townsend exhibited it alongside other family miniatures at the South Kensington Museum in 1862.⁷ In the Nelson-Atkins portrait, Smart depicts Horatio Townsend with a kind demeanor, but his temperament may not have always been the most agreeable. As a cousin summarized in a letter written ten years after Townsend’s death:

[He] was the eldest son of a man of fortune and, although well educated, his temper naturally bad was never restrained, and he became proud, morose, and unkind to his friends. I attribute the increase of those feelings to mis-management in domestic arrangements. His brother placed him in a lunatic asylum here, but the late Dr. Hallaran the medical inspector did not think him insane and discharged him in a very short time from the establishment.⁸

Notes

1. John and Bernard Burke, A Genealogical and Heraldic Dictionary of the Landed Gentry of Great Britain and Ireland (London: Henry Colburn, 1846), 2:1421. Elizabeth’s maiden name was also Townsend, but their exact familial relationship is unknown.

2. The majority of Townsend’s biography originates from John and Richard Townsend, “Horatio (Horace) Townsend (607),” The Townsend (Townshend) Family Records, last modified January 14, 2021, http://user.astro.wisc.edu/~townsend/tree/record.php?ref=607, which quotes from family letters. See also Trinity College, “Townsend, Horace,” Alumni Dublinenses: A Register of the Students, Graduates, Professors, and Provosts of Trinity College, in the University of Dublin, ed. George Burtchaell and Thomas Sadleir (London: Williams and Norgate, 1924), 818–19.

3. London Church of England Parish Registers, ref. P89/MRY1/178, London Metropolitan Archives. They had twelve children together, but six died before reaching their first birthday. Their surviving children included Horatio, Elizabeth, Charlotte, Aubrey, and John Townsend. Townsend, “Horatio (Horace) Townsend (607).”

4. See John Smart, Portrait of Elizabeth Townsend, 1784, watercolor on ivory, 1 7/16 x 1 1/8 in. (3.6 x 2.9 cm), Philadelphia Museum of Art, 1955-1-13, https://philamuseum.org/collection/object/54841. This group of miniatures, including the present Portrait of Horatio Townsend, were among those exhibited by Lieutenant John Townsend in 1862; see n. 7.

5. John Smart Junior, Horatio Townshend [sic] of Bridgemount, Co. Cork, 1801, watercolor on ivory, 2 7/16 in. (6.2 cm) high, sold at Christie’s, London, “Important Portrait Miniatures, Gold Boxes, and Objects of Vertu,” November 21, 2000, lot 106, https://www.christies.com/en/lot/lot-1924012; John Smart Junior, Mr. Townsend, 1804, watercolor on ivory, 2 7/16 x 1 7/8 in. (6.2 x 4.7 cm), repro. in Leo Schidlof, The Miniature in Europe in the 16th, 17th, 18th, and 19th Centuries (Graz: Akademische Druck, 1964), no. 1105, pl. 542.

6. William Maziere Brady, “Clonmeen,” Clerical and Parochial Records of Cork, Cloyne, and Ross (London: Longman, Green, Longman, Roberts, and Green, 1864), 2:143.

7. J. C. Robinson, ed., Catalogue of the Special Exhibition of Works of Art of the Mediaeval, Renaissance, and More Recent Periods, on Loan at the South Kensington Museum (London: George E. Eyre and William Spottiswoode, 1862), 241, no. 2699. The museum is now the Victoria and Albert Museum.

8. Dr. Edward Richard Townsend to “Dr Symonds,” November 19, 1855, quoted in Townsend, “Horatio (Horace) Townsend (607).” The doctor was William Saunders Hallaran of Cittadella asylum, Cork, Ireland.

Probably commissioned by the sitter, Horatio Townsend (1768–1824), Cork, Ireland, by 1800–1824;

Inherited by his wife, Elizabeth Trelawney Townsend (1775–1855), London, 1824–1855;

By descent to their son, Lieutenant John Townsend (1815–1884), Ellenborough Park, Weston-Super-Mare, 1855–1884 [1];

Possibly inherited by his wife, Marianne Oliver Townsend (1833–1910), Ellenborough Park, Weston-Super-Mare, 1884–1910 [2];

Possibly by descent to their son, Rev. Edward Mansel Townsend (1860–1947), England and Wales, 1910 [3];

Unknown owner, by December 19, 1950 [4];

Purchased at the unknown owner’s sale, Fine Gold Snuff Boxes, Objects of Art and Vertu, Miniatures, Coins, and Watches, Christie’s, London, December 19, 1950, lot 42, as Portrait of Horatio Townsend, Esq., by Leggatt Brothers, London, probably on behalf of Mr. John W. (1905–2000) and Mrs. Martha Jane (1906–2011) Starr, Kansas City, MO, 1950–1965 [5];

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

Notes

[1] “Lieut. John Townsend” exhibited a group of family portrait miniatures by John Smart, including the Nelson-Atkins portrait, in an 1862 South Kensington Museum exhibition. He is also referred to as Commander Townsend.

[2] Two miniatures previously in the collection of Lieut. John Townsend sold at Christie’s July 17, 1945, sale. They list the miniatures’ provenance as, “Mrs. Townsend in 1905,” implying that Townsend’s wife, Marianne, likely had the Nelson-Atkins miniature in her collection then.

[3] According to Richard Baxter Townshend and Dorothea Baker Townshend, “Addenda,” An Officer of the Long Parliament and His Descendants (London: Oxford University, 1892), 280: “Miniatures of Commander Townshend and his wife are in the possession of Mrs. Edward Townshend.” Rev. Edward Mansel Townsend’s wife, Jessie Frances Townsend (née Young, 1870–1933), could have been called Mrs. Edward Townsend. However, she died before him, so the portrait miniatures likely stayed within his possession.

[4] According to the 1950 sales catalogue, lots 1–42 were from “Different Properties.”

[5] The lot description states, “Portrait of Horatio Townsend, Esq., by John Smart, signed with initials and dated 1800, three-quarter face to the left, wearing blue coat and white stock, oval, 2 in. high, in leather case, with velvet stand.” According to Art Prices Current (1950–51), Leggatt bought lot 42 for £84.

An annotated sales catalogue is located at the University of Missouri-Kansas City’s Miller Nichols Library and is likely annotated by Mr. or Mrs. Starr. Archival research has shown that Leggatt Brothers served as purchasing agents for the Starrs. See correspondence between Betty Hogg and Martha Jane Starr, May 15 and June 3, 1950, Nelson-Atkins curatorial files.

John Smart, Mr. Townsend, n.d., watercolor on paper, dimensions unknown, sold at Christie’s, London, Sketches and Studies for Miniature Portraits by John Smart, December 17, 1936, lot 40.

John Smart Junior, Horatio Townshend of Bridgemount, Co. Cork, 1801, watercolor on ivory, 2 7/16 in. (6.2 cm), sold at Christie’s, London, Important Portrait Miniatures, Gold Boxes, and Objects of Vertu, November 21, 2000, lot 106.

John Smart Junior, Mr. Townsend, 1804, watercolor on ivory, 2 7/16 x 1 7/8 in. (6.2 x 4.7 cm), repro. in Leo Schidlof, The Miniature in Europe in the 16th, 17th, 18th, and 19th Centuries (Graz: Akademische Druck, 1964), no. 1105, pl. 542.

Special Exhibition of Works of Art of the Mediaeval, Renaissance, and More Recent Periods, on Loan at the South Kensington Museum, South Kensington Museum, London, June–October 1862, no. 2699, as Horatio Townsend.

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

The Starr Foundation Collection of Miniatures, The Royal Ontario Museum, Toronto, December 8, 1972–January 14, 1973, no cat., no. 133, as Horatio Townsend.

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 Horatio Townsend.

J. C. Robinson, ed., Catalogue of the Special Exhibition of Works of Art of the Mediaeval, Renaissance, and More Recent Periods, on Loan at the South Kensington Museum (London: George E. Eyre and William Spottiswoode, 1862), 241, no. 2699, as Horatio Townsend.

Catalogue of Fine Gold Snuff Boxes, Objects of Art and Vertu, Miniatures, Coins, and Watches (London: Christie’s, December 19, 1950), lot 42, as Portrait of Horatio Townsend, Esq.

Ross E. Taggart, The Starr Collection of Miniatures in the William Rockhill Nelson Gallery (Kansas City, MO: Nelson Gallery-Atkins Museum, 1971), no. 133, p. 47, (repro.), as Horatio Townsend.