Colonel Newport Charlett's Favourite Greyhounds, at Hanley Court, Worcestershire

The name William Henry Davis most commonly conjures up images of prize winning sheep and cows standing alone in the landscape in all their enormous glory. Davis was appointed animal painter to William IV in 1837 and to Queen Victoria in 1839 and became a great favourite amongst aristocratic breeders such as Lord Spencer, Thomas Coke, 1st Earl of Leicester, and Lord Berwick. However, prior to 1840 Davis worked in the sporting tradition laid out by earlier artists like John Ferneley Senior and John Frederick Herring. The sense of movement in the greyhound pack, leaping along beside the galloping horse in the present painting finds parallels in works such as Ferneley's John Burgess of Clipstone, Nottinghamshire, on a Favourite Horse, with his Harriers (London, Tate Britain, inv. no. T03423) or The Quorn Hunt (Liverpool, Walker Art Gallery).

James Wakeman Newport (1764-c.1864) of Hanley Court, Worcestershire, was the son of James Wakeman (d.1811) and his wife, Elizabeth, daughter and heiress of John Newport, of Hanley Court. In consequence of his wife's inheritance, James Wakeman had assumed the surname and arms of Newport. James Wakeman Newport entered the 28th regiment of infantry in 1781 and exchanged subsequently into the 6th regiment of the Enniskillen Dragoons, in which he held a commission for some years. On retiring from the line, he was appointed in 1792 to the lieutenant-colonelcy of the Worcestershire Militia and succeeded, as Colonel, to the command of the regiment in 1794. On the death of his cousin Richard Bourne Charlett, of Elmsley Hall, Worcestershire, in 1821, he inherited that part of Mr. Charlett's estate in which there was a reversionary interest and assumed the additional surname and arms of Charlett. A further painting of Colonel Newport and his hounds in an extensive wooded river landscape was executed in 1800 by John Nost Sartorius (sold in these rooms, 27 May 1999, lot 20, £90,600).