serious financial difficulties that in 1804 he was obliged to apply to parliament for permission to dispose of his property by lottery. This property was very considerable. In the previous year Messrs. Boydell had published a catalogue of their stock in forty-eight volumes, which comprised no less than 4,432 plates, of which 2,293 were after English artists. In a letter read to the House of Commons Boydell wrote: 'I have laid out with my brethren, in promoting the commerce of the fine arts in this country, above 350,000l.' In his printed lottery scheme it is stated that it had been proved before both houses of parliament that the plates from which the prize prints were taken cost upwards of 300,000l., his pictures and drawings 46,266l., and the Shakespeare Gallery upwards of 30,000l. The lottery consisted of 22,000 tickets, all of which were sold. The sum received enabled Boydell to pay his debts, but he died at his house in Cheapside on 12 Dec. 1804, before the lottery was drawn.
This was done on 28 Jan. 1805, when the chief prize, which included the Shakespeare Gallery, pictures and estate, fell to Mr. Tassie, nephew of the celebrated imitator of cameos in glass, who sold the property by auction. The pictures and two bas-reliefs by the Hon. Mrs. Darner realised 6,181l. 18s. 6d. The gallery was purchased by the British Institution, and Banks's 'Apotheosis of Shakespeare' was reserved for a monument over the remains of Boydell. This piece of sculpture, however, after remaining for many years in its original position over the entrance to the gallery, has now been removed to Stratford-upon-Avon.
Although Boydell appears to have been responsible for an imposition on the public in regard to Woollett's print of 'The Death of General Wolfe,' the entire property of which fell into his hands after the engraver's death—the plate was repaired and unlettered proofs printed and sold—his career was one of well-won honour and success, until the French revolution marred his prosperity. His influence in encouraging native art in England was great, and salutary, assuming proportions of national importance. It is true that the Boydell 'Shakespeare,' taken as a whole, seems now to shed little lustre on the English school, but this was not Boydell's fault; he employed the best artists he could get—Reynolds, Stothard, Smirke, Romney, Fuseli, Opie, Barry, West, Wright of Derby, Angelica Kauffman, Westall, Hamilton, and others. It must also be remembered that this was the first great effort of the kind ever made by English artists, and its influence cannot easily be overestimated. Boydell deserves great credit for his patriotism, generosity to artists, and public spirit. To the corporation of London he presented the frescoes by Rigaud on the cupola of the common-council chamber, and many other paintings, including Reynolds's 'Lord Heathfield;' to the Stationers' Company, West's 'Alfred the Great' and Graham's 'Escape of Mary Queen of Scots.' It was his intention, before the reverse of his fortunes, to bequeath the Shakespeare gallery of paintings to the nation. In 1748 he married Elizabeth Lloyd, second daughter of Edward Lloyd of the Fords, near Oswestry, in Shropshire, by whom he had no issue. He was buried at St. Olave's, Coleman Street.
[Chalmers's Biog. Dict.; Redgrave's Dict. of Artists (1878); Bryan's Dict. (Graves, now in course of publication); Annual Reg. (1804); Gent. Mag. (1804); Hayley's Life of Romney; Nollekens and his Times; Pye's Patronage of British Art; A Collection of Views in England and Wales by J. B. (1790); Shakespeare's Dramatic Works revised by Steevens, with plates, 9 vols. (1802); A Description of several Pictures presented to the Corporation of London by J. B. (1794); Catalogues of Pictures in Shakespeare Gallery (1789-1802); Hansard's Parliamentary Debates, vol. i. 1803-4, p. 249.]
BOYDELL, JOSIAH (1752–1817), painter and engraver, nephew of Alderman John Boydell [q. v.], was born at the Manor House, near Hawarden, Flintshire, on 18 Jan. 1752. Giving early proofs of his love for art and his capacity in design, he was sent to London and placed under the care and patronage of his uncle, whose partner and successor he eventually became. He drew from the antique, studied painting under Benjamin West, and acquired the art of mezzotinto engraving from Richard Earlom. When Alderman Boydell undertook the publication of the series of engravings from the famous Houghton collection previous to its removal to the Hermitage, St. Petersburg, he employed his nephew and Joseph Farington to make the necessary drawings from the pictures for the use of the engravers. Boydell painted several of the subjects for the Shakespeare Gallery, and exhibited portraits and historical subjects at the Royal Academy between 1772 and 1799. He resided for some time at Hampstead, and during the French war assisted in forming the corps known as the Loyal Hampstead Volunteers, of which he was lieutenant-colonel. He was master of the Stationers' Company, and succeeded his uncle as alderman of the ward of Cheap, but ill-health compelled him to resign this latter office within a few years. During the latter part of his life he resided at Halliford,
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