Description
watercolour on ivory, in a later yellow metal frame inset with nine old round-cut diamonds
Dimensions
3.5cm high
Footnote
Provenance: Ex. Sotheby's, Bond Street, London, 30 May 1977, lot 63.
Ex. Christie's, March 1985, lot 298.
Note: Charles Paxton was an American Loyalist, born in 1704 and was Customs Surveyor and Marshall of the Vice Admiralty Court in Boston, Massachusetts. The town of Paxton, Mass. was named for him in 1765. He was a life-long friend of Charles Townshend, the British Chancellor, and was appointed a Commissioner of the American Board of Customs, established in Boston in 1767. As a controversial tax official, he was often attacked by mobs and was hung in effigy on the Liberty Tree in Boston. His request for British soldiers to be sent to Boston is regarded as one of the earliest actions leading to the Boston Massacre in 1770 and Tea Party in 1773, eventually paving the way for the American Revolution. After being evacuated with fellow Loyalists from Boston in 1776, he settled in England and died there in 1788.