The Rice Portrait Provenance

A fascinating portrait, its provenance and history...

Thanks to my friend Jane Odiwe for her help in making this information available via her blog.

Colonel Thomas Austen, (1775 - 1859) the third owner of the portrait, was Jane's second cousin, and a great friend of Edward Knight, her brother. They were both fanatical cricketers, and played in the Duke of Dorset's (the founder of the MCC's) team, called at one point, 'The Gentlemen of Kent'. Elizabeth Austen, my husband Henry's great, great grandmother, knew him well. We know from her that he rode very well to hounds, was a fine shot, and also played the violin. His mother, Elizabeth Motley Austen (née Wilson) had had a great admirer called Sir Horace Mann who also taught him to play brilliant cricket. His army career was very distinguished, and he was made Governor of the Algarve during the Penninsular wars, (where he was reprimanded by the top brass for being too easy on French spies!) He fought in America in the 40th regiment of foot, the Green Jackets, and under Wellington, and visited South Africa, Canada, and the West Indies. In 1803, he married the obligatory heiress, (as his eldest brother Lucius was not stable) one Margaretta Morland whose family had made a fortune out of sugar and rum in the West Indies. Colonel Thomas and Margaretta married in Bath in 1803, and Margaretta was left behind at Kippington with his mother and father, whilst he was abroad. They had no children, and during his long absences

Margaretta turned a wing at Kippington into a small school-like operation; looking after motherless girls of friends whose mothers had died in childbed. Sadly, those abounded in the eighteenth century, and thereby hangs a tale. Both Elizabeth and Fanny Austen, Edward Austen/Knight's daughters stayed with her, and so did Elizabeth Hall, the only daughter of another rich Jamaican plantation owner, Thomas Hall. Again, in family recollection, he was a terrible hypochondriac, and the two of them are supposed to be the inspiration for 'Emma', and her father 'Mr. Woodhouse'. This is borne out by archives which refer to a letter written to him by a friend telling him to pull himself together, think of his daughter and stop complaining about his health, (after his wife's death). The motherless girls were referred to as Margaretta's 'protegés', and when the portrait of Jane was given to Elizabeth Hall on her marriage to Colonel Thomas Harding-Newman in 1818, it explains why she knew the family, Jane, and the portrait so well. She was given it because she was 'a great admirer of the novelist', not just of her books, but of Jane herself.

Colonel Austen and Margaretta were always very close to Edward Knight's family, and therefore also close to Edward Royd Rice, Henry's ancestor. Indeed, during their engagement Edward injured himself in a fall from a horse and whilst he recovered, Elizabeth went to stay with Colonel Thomas and Margaretta at Kippington. Colonel Thomas and Margaretta stayed at Godmersham for the wedding of Elizabeth Austen to Edward Royd Rice, in 1818 on October 6th, the day before Edward Knight's birthday, and the story goes that the bride of 18 ran around the tops of the garden walls after the ceremony still wearing her wedding dress! It must have been a wonderful party! Colonel Thomas Austen died in 1859, by all accounts a much loved patron and landowner. Elizabeth Hall who married Colonel Thomas Harding Newman in 1818 was the fourth owner of the portrait. She was his second wife, and acquired his son by his first wife Elizabeth Cartwright, as her step-son. In family lore she was the model for Jane Austen's "Emma" so one can only suppose her to be managing and somewhat manipulative; I wonder also if she was a good matchmaker! In any case, she was nineteen when she married and died young, again, I believe in childbirth, in 1831. Her husband married again, but on his death in 1856 the portrait was inherited by his eldest son, the Rev. Dr. Thomas Harding Newman, the fifth owner of the portrait. The Rev. Dr. Thomas Harding Newman 1811-1882 The fifth owner of the portrait never married. A don at Oxford he hung the portrait in his rooms at Magdalen College where by all accounts he was exceedingly proud of it. So proud in fact, that he decided that the portrait had been painted by Zoffany. The name Humphry is written across the right hand corner of the painting, but rather indistinctly. He may have made a genuine mistake as the names both end in y, or he may just have chosen the smarter artist. Be that as it may, this mis-attribution caused a very great problem for the poor picture later in my story. Humphry and Zoffany were great friends, and Zoffany is credited with teaching Humphry how to paint muslins and draperies whilst they were together in India. Humphry also figures in Zoffany's famous painting 'Colonel Mordaunt's Cockfight' painted in India. This helped the confusion. Also up at Magdalen at the time, and friends of Harding-Newman, were the first cousins Lord Brabourne, and Morland Rice, Elizabeth Austen-Rice's 4th son, an extremely clever and handsome young man who became a close friend of the Rev. Harding Newman. He always promised Morland that he would leave him the portrait in his will " as you are a relative of the lady". However, he died in 1882 without doing so officially. His nephew, and heir Benjamin Harding-Newman, a member of a very honorable family knew of his uncle's wish, and gave the picture to a friend of Morland Rice's, Dr. Bloxham, to deliver to him in 1883, the year after the Rev. Dr. Harding-Newman's death. Morland Rice, the sixth owner of the portrait was the fourth son of Elizabeth Austen and Edward Royd Rice, who must have been devoted, producing fifteen children in all. He was called Morland after his mother's 'dear friend from girlhood' Margaretta Morland, and received the portrait in 1883. He wrote to various members of the family about it, and was told by the elderly family historian Miss Fanny Caroline Lefroy (whose mother had known Jane Austen) that she 'knew before of the portrait in your posession, and but for one or two difficulties would have no doubt about its authenticity'. She also believed that 'the date on your picture is (she thinks) 1788 or 9, making her (Jane) not 14.' She was correct, we have discovered a date on the back of Jane's canvas of 1788, making her in that year, not quite 13. The other small difficulties were that the Rice family believed the false 'Zoffany' attribution, and were wondering if the portrait could have been painted in Bath. In 1884 Morland's first cousin Lord Brabourne, Fanny Knight's eldest son, published the first book of Jane Austen's letters. He discovered that Morland Rice posessed Jane's portrait and enquired of Mr. Cholmondley Austen-Leigh (who knew the portrait) about it. Mr. Cholmondley Austen-Leigh wrote to Lord Brabourne who then wrote to his publisher Bentley, as follows: 'Mr. Austen-Leigh writes that the evidence seems against the authenticity of the picture, which must be if authentic of Jane when a young girl of 14 or 15.' Lord Brabourne then continues: 'Mr. Rice's letter, without communication with Mr. Austen-Leigh, says it is of a girl of 15, I incline to think therefore it is a true bill.' He then published it, half-length as the frontispiece for his book. Another letter describing John Morland's enjoyment of the portrait was written by his niece, Marcia Rice: "Over his drawing-room hung the portrait of Jane Austen by Zoffany - it was his great pride. Often did he relate the story of how Dr. Newman of Magdalen used to say to him - 'You ought to posess the portrait of your great-aunt, I shall leave it to you.' He had never the slightest doubt as to its authenticity to mar his joy in the posession of the portrait." Morland Rice married Caroline York in 1864 but died childless in 1897 leaving the portrait to his younger brother's wife, his sister-in-law who had married Admiral Sir Ernest Rice. Admiral Sir Ernest Rice 1840-1927 The seventh owner of the portrait, Sir Ernest Rice, rose to the rank of Admiral and at one point was made Governor of Malta. He is reputed to have been more than attached to the Queen of Greece, and although certainly dashing, managed to run two of his ships aground which caused him to be known as 'Ground Rice' in the Navy! (My husband met Lord Louis Mountbatten who asked him if the 'Ground Rice' who had taught him navigation was any relation. Henry said that he was, and added that the family believed his navigational skills were somewhat sketchy!) He received the painting from his wife, the sister of Morland Rice's wife on their deaths. He hung it over the fireplace, at his home at Sibbertswold House near Dover, but unfortunately one cold December night he burnt his house down. Although 80 at the time, he himself threw all the family portraits out of the drawing room windows. Tradition has it that Jane went first, but he broke her frame when she hit the lawn, and afterwards he cut the picture down (as was the somewhat barbaric custom then to fit her into a smaller, plainer Victorian frame.) Thus it was that Ozias Humphry's notes along the back of the top of the portrait were folded back and hidden under the stretcher and a new lining. Ozias had run a large studio, and wrote on the back of his pictures noting the name, the date, and often initializing these notes with his distinctive OH monogram. He also did this on his miniatures and pastels. (My husband sold a small portrait of Edward Knight which had belonged to Elizabeth Austen to Chawton House Museum. A member of the public sent in a sketch of it to the museum which was inscribed on the back with his name and the date. It was painted in 1783, at the time of his adoption, and is also by Ozias Humphry.) On his death in 1927, his daughter Gwenlian inherited Jane's portrait; she had married Lord Northbourne, a local peer. Lady Northbourne, the eighth owner of the portrait gave the painting back to the main branch of the family, Henry Rice 1864-1943, her first cousin. Her father, Sir Ernest had considered giving it to the National Portrait Gallery, but eventually decided his cousin should have it, as he still lived in the large house, Dane Court, which had been bought by Edward Royd Rice and Elizabeth Austen on their marriage. (The then Henry Rice had owned a fast ship, the East Indiaman ‘Dutton’, which made three trips to India collecting a fortune in tea, silks, and spices.) He had married ‘The Heiress of Dover’, Sarah Sampson, some say for a bet, and he was also known affectionately as ‘The Pirate’, again probably quite true! (She is mentioned in Jane Austen’s letters, as is their reprobate eldest son Henry, whose mother constantly paid his large debts.) Gwenlian Northbourne stipulated that Jane should no longer hang over the fireplace, ‘as the smoke was spoiling her.’ She died in 1955. Henry Edward Harcourt Rice 1864-1943 left the portrait in 1928, the ninth owner of the picture did not hang it over a hot fire, and presided over an odd episode in its history. (All the following history can be checked in the files on the ‘Rice Portrait’ in the National Portrait Gallery.) In 1930, the National Portrait Gallery was expanding their stock of pictures, and the public were agitating for an image of Jane Austen. Indeed, this was the N.P.G.'s priority at that time, as they did not possess one. They deputed a lady called Mrs. Graveson on to find one, and she came across an old gentleman whom she described as a ‘delightful old Victorian’. This was one John Hubback, the grandson of Admiral Sir Francis Austen, Jane’s brother. This old chap was nearly 90, but in full possession of his faculties, and had lived in the same house as his grandfather when a boy, indeed, Admiral Sir Francis had taught him to play chess. (His father, the husband of the Admiral’s daughter went insane, and they both lived with his grandfather.) He told Mrs. Graveson that his cousins, the Rices, possessed the only portrait ever painted by a professional artist, e.g. Zoffany. Mr. Hubback visited Henry Rice, my Henry’s grandfather, but was told that although he had no intention of parting with the portrait, he had, however, consented to a copy of it being made for the National Portrait Gallery. This, the family has always considered is primary evidence that it is Jane, Mr. Hubback’s grandfather Admiral Sir Francis having been unlikely to tell a lie about his own sister. Sir Henry Hake, Director of the National Portrait Gallery somewhat huffily declined the offer of a copy, saying that the ‘N.P.G. do not deal in fakes’ – but asked for first refusal should the picture ever be sold. They then acquired the tiny ‘scratch’ by Cassandra Austen, and at this time announced in the Times that they possessed the only portrait of Jane that could be authenticated, which the Rice family felt to be an unnecessary crack at them, as they had a perfect right to keep their Great-Great-Aunt Jane if they wished to. However, in the 1940’s R.W. Chapman raised doubts over the ‘Zoffany’ attribution, Zoffany having been in India until 1791, whilst Ozias Humphry had returned to England in the spring of 1788. He consulted a man called Adams, who because he himself could not discover a girl wearing a comparable dress to the Rice portrait, pronounced that the dress was 19th century, not 18th century. Marie Antoinette herself sent a high-waisted muslin gown to the Duchess of Devonshire in the 1780’s, which she wore to the Prince Regent’s ball to great acclaim. From the 1760’s, children and young adolescents had been wearing this type of gown, the forerunner of the fashion, which adults adopted. The Rice portrait remained quietly at Dane Court until inherited by my Henry’s father, Edward Rice, in 1943. Edward Rice 1899-1973 Edward Rice inherited the portrait as the tenth owner on his father’s death in 1943. He married a great heiress, Lord Curzon of Kedleston’s stepdaughter, Marcella Duggan, and built a ballroom onto Dane Court, which was large, echoing, and rather draughty when I knew it. However, the painting looked well there. Unfortunately, Marcella and Edward Rice were divorced having had three children, and Henry’s new French stepmother (who owned a home in Normandy) was an acquisitive and unkind lady. On Edward Rice’s death in 1973, she stripped the whole of Dane Court, sending most of the contents to Christie’s and Sotheby’s, and the rest to France. Very luckily, she was unable to take the family portraits, or the books, but she even removed the marble baths and wash hand basins, a clean s weep: (This last, however, she was forced to return.) My Henry, sickened at this rape of his family’s possessions, sold Dane Court and the estate in 1975. We were married in that year and lived for some time in Guernsey. Henry Rice 1928-2010 My late husband, Henry Rice, was the 11th owner of the portrait, and it is because of his fury at those who doubted its authenticity, and the untiring efforts to put this right, that it is now known as the ‘Rice Portrait’. He minded the slur on his family’s veracity as much as the attack on his own truthfulness – as his old uncle remarked plaintively, “They may not like you, Henry, but what on earth have they got against the rest of us?” What indeed? I suspect it was because of his decision to sell the portrait to help his family; if money had not been involved things would have been easier. The N.P.G. (having decided their sketch was the only authentic picture of Jane) did not wish to buy it, although its provenance is ‘impeccable’, vide Chapman! So when Henry applied for an export license for the picture it was granted. It was about this time he also discovered the correspondence that showed Sir Henry Hake’s attempts to buy the portrait from his grandfather in the N.P.G. archive. He was greatly helped by Brian Stewart, the Director of the Falmouth Art Gallery. Brian had written, ‘A Dictionary of English Portrait Painters’, (with Mervyn Cutten whom Henry also knew. He attributed ‘Jane’ without question to Ozias Humphry, (and also latterly, the large oil of Edward Knight, her brother), and lectured on this in New York. Sadly, he had an accident last year, 2010, and died not long after Henry. ‘The attribution to Ozias Humphry was recently confirmed by the discovery of a Christie’s valuation made in 1985, which identified the monogram of Ozias Humphry, and attributed the work to him in full. The monogram was impaired shortly after the valuation during Conservation work. The Brushwork, colouring, cherub lips, inconsistencies in drawing, and the characteristic habit of “Topping and tailing” (saving the highest quality of finish for the head and lower legs) are typical of the artist.’ Brian Stewart The portrait thought to be Cassandra, literally the ‘sister’ portrait hanging at Kippington descended in that line, inherited by John Austen first, Colonel Thomas’s heir and nephew, then by his only child, Marianne, a daughter who married a gentleman called Smith Marriot. She was an heiress, and he was well heeled, so they emigrated to the South of France where they lived in a Bastide in Grasse, Maganosc, the Villa Mariquita on the Rue Auguste Renoir. They again had only one child, a daughter Charlotte Marianne known as May or Mai. She married firstly, a man called Dodgson, (a relative of Lewis Carroll,) by whom she had a much-loved son, Raymond, and secondly, a chap called Harrison, who died in the late 40’s. In 1951 she decided to return to her birthplace, France, her son had been killed in Somalia in the early part of the war, and the Knights of Chawton were her nearest living relations, indeed, they inherited her son’s monies on his death. May Harrison sent back some of her Austen collection to her Austen cousins, and also wrote to R.W. Chapman November 28th 1952 (from the Chapman archive in the Bodleian Library) saying she owned by descent, a portrait which she believed could be Jane Austen, and asking for an opinion. He sent her request and, (a now lost,) photograph of the picture to R.A. Austen Leigh asking for his opinion. The Austen Leigh family looked at the portrait (the letter is quoted below,) and returned the letter from Mrs. Harrison to R. W. Chapman. It never seems to have occurred to them that the portrait could have been Cassandra. Henry and I met a nephew of Mrs. Harrison’s who vaguely remembered a portrait of a girl in a white dress who looked older than the ‘Zoffany girl’, (ours,) but being young at the time, could recall no more about it. By the time Henry found out where in Grasse Mrs. Harrison could be found, she had died, leaving no will, at the age, I believe, of ninety. However, this bore out our belief that Cassandra and Jane had been painted together in 1788. Henry carried on his research valiantly until he went nearly blind before his death in January 2010. My brother and I have continued his work to establish the true identity of the painting, and will publish our results shortly. We believe in the painting as passionately as Henry did, that this is a portrait of Jane Austen executed by Ozias Humphry R.A. in 1788, and also that it will be recognised for what it is.

Mrs. Thomas Harding-Newman 1789-1831, and The Rev. Dr. Thomas Harding Newman 1811-1882

The Rev. John Morland Rice, 1823-1897, and Admiral Sir Ernest Rice, 1840-1927

Lady Northbourne, née Gwenlian Rice 1871-1952, and Henry Edward Harcourt Rice 1864-1943

November 28th 1952 Great Abshot Titchfield Hants Mr Dear RWC Sunday As to the portrait it is charming and Margaret would like to believe it is JA, but after careful consideration today, helped by Winifred Jenkins, we decided against it being JA and thought the picture was more like the Zoffany girl than like JA. Indeed, as it comes via Mrs. Harrison from the Kippington (or Capel Manor) stable, the Zoffany one belonged to a Kippington Austen, there seems quite a probability of it and the Zoffany being the same person. But perhaps Adams will say that they cannot be the same person owing to the costume! Many thanks for your note about the Knight pictures. I knew they were coming up for sale – but not the actual date. But I don’t want to buy any and certainly haven’t got the money. I return the portrait. Yours ever R. A. Austen Leigh P.S. I return Mrs. Harrison’s letter