Hailes Castle lies about a mile and a half south-west of the town of East Linton between Dunbar and Haddington. Turner visited it on his way to Haddington on 12 or 13 August 1831. Although Hailes is now in a more ruinous state than it was in Turner’s time, this sketch is identifiable by comparison with a drawing by Alexander Archer, to which it bears a close resemblance.
1The view is from the north-east and includes the River Tyne in the foreground. There are further views on folios 35 verso, 43 verso, 44 verso, 45, 47 verso and 80 (
D25987,
D25999,
D26001,
D26002,
D26007,
D26072; CCLXVII 35a, 43a, 44a, 45, 47, 82), and a very small and slight sketch in the
Berwick sketchbook (Tate
D25683; Turner Bequest CCLXV 23a).
Finberg wrongly identified this sketch as Craigmillar Castle owing to its proximity to a sketch of that building on folio 25 (
D25972; CCLXVII 25).
2 Wilton’s suggestion that this is the basis for Turner’s watercolour of Craigmillar Castle, engraved for volume 23 of Sir Walter Scott’s
Prose Work is therefore erroneous; the work was in fact based on a sketch made in 1818 (Tate
D13707; Turner Bequest CLXVII 67a).
There is a light brown stain at the centre left of the page.
Thomas Ardill
September 2009
