William Bradford

Fairhaven Harbor (Old Tack Works Wharf)

Monogramed and dated lower right: JF.K. / ‘64.

Signed and indistinctly dated lower right: William F. de Haas; on verso: South Coast of Block island

In 1852, twenty-nine year old William Bradford was a failing shopkeeper in Fairhaven, Massachusetts. With a wife and child at home, Bradford, by his own admission, “spent too much time in painting to succeed” in business. Rescued from insolvency by his well-to-do in-laws, this is not the beginning of a narrative that generally leads to a happy ending. Not so with Bradford, who ultimately found international fame and fortune as a painter of arctic seascapes and dramatic marine paintings. William Bradford, the artist, was a lineal descendant of the 17th-century Separatist leader William Bradford, a founder of the Plymouth Plantation, signer of the Mayflower Compact and Governor of the Plymouth Colony. Our Bradford born to a New Bedford ship outfitter in Fairhaven, Massachusetts By the nineteenth century, this line of Bradfords were Quakers, living on the tract purchased nearly two centuries earlier by their pilgrim ancestor. Fairhaven, across the mouth of the Acushnet River from the whaling center of New Bedford was described by a New York journalist in 1857 as “the Brooklyn of New Bedford” (Home Journal, January 3, 1857). Young Bradford displayed an early predilection for the arts, but his Quaker parents were disinclined to support this particular pursuit. After working in his father’s business and then for a dry goods merchant in New Bedford, by 1849 Bradford had set up in New Bedford as a “merchant tailor” offering outfits for “those going to California,” “seamen’s clothing,” custom-tailored “piece goods...

"The Harbour Mouth" by F. E. Jamieson (British 1895-1950) signed lower corner with the artists pseudonym 'Phil Hips' oil painting on canvas, unframed canvas: 16 x 24 inches Fine quality antique oil painting by the much admired and celebrated British artist F. E. Jamieson (1895-1950). The painting is signed by Jamieson to the lower corner with one of his pseudonym's "Phil Hips". The painting captures this rarer subject for the artist, depicting the mouth of a coastal inlet harbour entrance. F. E. Jamieson (1895-1950) We are extremely fortunate to have been handling the works of the enigmatic British artist, F. E. Jamieson since the year we began art dealing, 1989. Over this time, coupled with our love of the Scottish landscape, we have bought and sold many hundreds of his paintings, in all their various guises and subjects and are considered by many to be a leading authority on the artist and his work. We are also in the early stages of publishing the Catalogue Raisonne for this artist, of which this painting will be featured. Mr. Jamieson was largely a painter of Scottish landscapes and loch scenes. Born in 1895, Jamieson lived on the south coast of England and was contracted to a large department store to supply them with his paintings. He was an ambitious man and keen to sell more works than through just one shop. In order to do this, he started to sign his works with pseudonyms other than his own name, in order that he could sell his work to a wider audience. It worked and it is considered that Jamieson at least 15 different pseudonym names on his paintings. In addition to selling through furniture shops, Jamieson would travel door to door offering his paintings to housewives and private buyers. In our years of researching the artist, we heard one story related to us by an old customer who remembers that Jamieson started selling door...