Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Childe, Elias
CHILDE, ELIAS (fl. 1798–1848), landscape painter, was a very prolific artist, painting both in oil and in water colours. He first exhibited in 1798, when he appears to have been residing at 29 Compton Street, Soho, together with James Warren Childe [q. v.], who was probably his brother. From the first he always confined himself to landscape, and achieved considerable success in this line of art. In 1825 he was elected a fellow of the Society of Artists, and exhibited upwards of five hundred pictures at the exhibitions of that society, the Royal Academy, and the British Institution. His pictures were very popular, and always commanded a good sale. He particularly excelled in moonlight effects, and there is an example of this style in the National Gallery of British Art at South Kensington. He exhibited for the last time in 1848, after which date he cannot be traced.
[Redgrave’s Dict. of English Artists; Graves's Dict. of Artists, 1760-1880; Arnold's Magazine of the Fine Arts; Catalogues of the Royal Academy, &c.]