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

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8
J.M.W. Turner > 1802-18 Academician and professor > West Country and Yorkshire 1814-17 > Devon Rivers, No.2 Sketchbook > Artwork

Joseph Mallord William Turner The Mill Pool, Dartmouth 1814

Image 1 of 2
Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘The Mill Pool, Dartmouth’ 1814
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 50 Recto:
The Mill Pool, Dartmouth 1814
D09730
Turner Bequest CXXXIII 50
Pencil on white wove paper, 110 x 178 mm
Part watermark ‘ows | 2’
Inscribed by Turner in pencil ‘Sea’ top centre and ‘Wood’ at centre
Inscribed by John Ruskin in blue ink ‘50’ bottom right, descending vertically, and ‘294’ bottom left, descending vertically
Stamped in black ‘CXXXIII 50’ bottom right
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
Eric Shanes has identified the view as of Dartmouth from the west, looking to the Dart down the Ford Valley, at that time a tidal inlet but since reclaimed and built upon, with the tower of St Saviour’s Church on the right. The hill on the left is now the site of the Britannia Royal Naval College. Shanes has related the drawing to a ‘colour beginning’ (Tate D25162; Turner Bequest CCLXIII 40) which corresponds in the main points of topography, although the church tower is omitted.1 The viewpoint, today obstructed by trees and later development, appears to be around the top of Mount Boone.
This is the first of a sequence of views around Dartmouth and the Dart Estuary, running on to folio 60 recto (D09744). Turner also made drawings here in 1811 on his first West Country tour, in the Devonshire Coast, No.1 sketchbook (Tate D08365, D08366, D08527, D08528, D08783, D08786, D08788; Turner Bequest CXXIII 2a, 3, 84, 84a, 235a, 237a, 239) and the Corfe to Dartmouth sketchbook (Tate D08856–D08862; Turner Bequest CXXIV 41–47).
1
Shanes 1997, p.75; for the watercolour see ibid. no.63, reproduced (colour).
Verso:
Blank. There is a small, brown oily spot, showing through to the recto and also affecting folio 49 verso (D09729), as well as folio 51 recto opposite (D09731).

Matthew Imms
July 2014

How to cite

Matthew Imms, ‘The Mill Pool, Dartmouth 1814 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, July 2014, in David Blayney Brown (ed.), J.M.W. Turner: Sketchbooks, Drawings and Watercolours, Tate Research Publication, September 2014, https://www.tate.org.uk/art/research-publications/jmw-turner/joseph-mallord-william-turner-the-mill-pool-dartmouth-r1147281, accessed 26 April 2024.