Joseph Mallord William Turner

This vignette, The Boy of Egremond was published in the 1834 edition of Rogers’s Poems and appears as the head-piece to a poem of the same title.1 The engraver was Edward Goodall.2 Rogers’s poem tells of the son of twelfth-century noble William Fitz Duncan. Popularly known as the ‘Boy of Egremond’ (or Egremont), the youngster drowned while crossing the River Wharfe in Yorkshire at a narrow and especially turbulent point, which as Turner notes in the margin of his own copy of the 1827 edition of Poems is known as the ‘Strid’ (see Tate D36330; Turner Bequest CCCLXVI p.203).3 The poet recounts the tale with overflowing sentiment:

Turner’s illustration shows the young boy accompanied by his hound and hawk about to embark on his ill-fated crossing. The composition appears to be derived from a small pencil thumbnail sketch which the artist made in the margin of his working copy of the book (see Tate D36330; Turner Bequest CCCLXVI p.203). In addition Turner also made a tiny drawing of a large building with square towers and walls. This appears to be Bolton Castle, the medieval ruins which appear in the background of the finished vignette (see Tate D36330; Turner Bequest CCCLXVI p.202). The rest of the backdrop is a dramatic view of the North Yorkshire landscape, a part of the country with which Turner was very familiar, having visited the area several times between 1797 and 1825. Topographical sketches featuring the Wharfedale valley, for example, can be found in the Devonshire Rivers No.3 and Wharfedale sketchbook (Turner Bequest CXXXIV), Hastings sketchbook (Turner Bequest CXXXIX), Yorkshire 2 and Yorkshire 5 sketchbooks (Turner Bequest CXLV and CXLVIII), and the Farnley sketchbook (Turner Bequest CLIII). He also made one large detailed drawing to which he may have referred, The Strid, Bolton Woods (see Tate D12119; Turner Bequest CLIV U).