Portrait of William, 3rd Viscount Courtenay, later 9th Earl of Devon (1768-1835) circa 1793

Richard Cosway RA (1742-1821)

Watercolour on ivory

Oval, height 2 ⅞ inches; 7.2 cm

Provenance:

Edward Joseph, no. 64 (in 1889).?Frank Woodroffe.?John Pierpont Morgan (1837-1913), New York; (+) Christie's, London 24-27 June 1935, lot 250 (as George IV, when Prince of Wales) (55gns. to Frank Partridge).?Christie's, London, 18 June 1974, lot 67 (as George IV, when Prince of Wales).
English Private Collection

Literature:

G. C. Williamson, Catalogue of the Collection of Miniatures. The Property of J. Pierpont Morgan, II, London, 1907, no. 242, p. 42, illustrated pl. LXXVIII (as H.R.H. George, Prince of Wales).

Exhibited:

London, Burlington Fine Arts Club, 1889 (lent by E. Joseph).

William Courtenay is best remembered for his ill-fated friendship with William Beckford (1760-1844). Their close relationship caused a nationwide scandal in 1784 when Beckford (then a man of 24) was charged with sexual misconduct with the young Courtenay, a teenager of 16. The episode forced the eccentric and extravagant Beckford from polite society and into a decade of exile in Europe.

Affectionately known as ‘Kitty’, Courtenay was spoilt, extravagant and a great patron of the arts. This portrait miniature is testimony to his allegiance to one of England’s greatest miniaturists, Richard Cosway (1742-1811). Painted circa 1793, when Cosway was at the height of his artistic career, he is shown him as an assured and fashionable young man, unruffled by the early scandal in his life. The lock of hair, tied simply on an ivory panel on the reverse, suggests that the miniature was for a close friend or lover.

Viscount Courtenay fled to America in 1811, from his family seat at Powderham Castle, to escape his creditors. He resided at the Claremont on the Hudson before purchasing the Château Dreveil in Paris in 1825-1826, where he continued to live in style and excess. He never married and seems to have been openly homosexual, spending his last years in Paris where he died in 1835. His former lover, William Beckford, died nine years later in Bath, never to be reunited with Courtenay, whom he had called the "only person to whom I can communicate my feelings - or to whom I can disclose the strange wayward passion which throbs this very instant in my bosom."