J.M.W. Turner: Sketchbooks, Drawings and Watercolours

Although it has in the past been assumed1 that the letter is from Turner to his Yorkshire friend and patron Walter Fawkes, this is not absolutely proven and the postmark poses further complications. Finberg read it as ‘Langholme’ but this is uncertain. There is a Langho near Whalley in Lancashire, visited by Turner at least twice, in the late 1790s and again in 1809. It might be tempting, but also inconclusive, to interpret the postmark as an old spelling of Langhold, where Langold Hall was the seat of another Yorshire patron, Henry Gally Knight, author and classicist, who had supplied a sketch from which Turner painted The Temple of Jupiter Panellenius in the Island of Aegina... exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1816 (the Duke of Northumberland).2 From 31 July 1816, and in November 1817, Turner corresponded with the artist James Holworthy about possible meetings at Langold; subsequent letters anticipate hearing from Holworthy and Knight, in letters to Farnley, about their availability.3 Turner was in the Gargrave area in 1809 and also in 1816.

The ‘subject to be done for Mr Fawkes’ is presumably that of Hall Beck Gill on the recto (D12099; Turner Bequest CLIV A). There is a watercolour study of a different view of Hall Beck Gill (Tate D17179; Turner Bequest CXCVI O), based on a sketch in the Large Farnley sketchbook, Tate D09023; Turner Bequest CXXVIII 7), and another watercolour study (Tate D25492; Turner Bequest CCXLIII 369) based on a sketch in the Devonshire Rivers, No.3, and Wharfedale sketchbook (Tate D09804; Turner Bequest CXXXIV 14), but no finished watercolour is known.