An Oxfordshire Volunteer, Charles Chappell

Watercolour, heightened with body colour on heavy duty Bristol Paper - framed and glazed

A contemporary manuscript label to the reverse identifies the subject as Charles Chappell. The Oxfordshire Volunteers, not to be confused with the city of Oxford Volunteers or  Oxfordshire Militia (1757-1816), were formed in 1808 as a voluntary force for the purposes of defence against invasion by Napoleonic France. They were disbanded in 1813. The reverse further carries the trade label of the framer Hugh Richards, whose name appears in Kent's Trade Directory of Cities of London and Westminster, & Borough of Southwark, for the Year 1794 as a Carver & Glass-grinder, of 279, The Strand, London.