John Carnac

Inscriptionback to top

Signed and inscribed on card backing: O:H: pt:/1786/Calcutta

This portraitback to top

The identification is probably correct, although the earliest reference to it (‘Colonel Carnac’) appears to have been the 1920 Wellesley sale catalogue. Carnac arrived in Calcutta on 16 December 1786; Humphry had returned there in mid-November. [1] There are no significant comparable portraits, Carnac being otherwise identified as a minor figure in history paintings by West and Zoffany.

Footnotesback to top

1) M. Archer, India and British Portraiture 1770-1825, 1979, pp 173, 191, 198.

Physical descriptionback to top

Clear grey eyes, grey powdered hair tied with a black ribbon, red coat with silver epaulette, blue facings and silver-edged blue buttons.

Provenanceback to top

Francis Wellesley sale, Sotheby’s, 3rd day, 30 June 1920, lot 459;¹ Hon Frederic H. A. Wallop (d. 1953), by whom lent to the Victoria and Albert Museum 1927-49; his nephew Alan Evans; by whom bequeathed to the National Gallery 1974; lent to the NPG until permanently transferred 1994.

¹ Described as ‘one of the finest miniatures by Humphry that has ever been sold’.


This extended catalogue entry is from the out-of-print National Portrait Gallery collection catalogue: John Ingamells, National Portrait Gallery: Mid-Georgian Portraits 1760-1790, National Portrait Gallery, 2004, and is as published then. For the most up-to-date details on individual Collection works, we recommend reading the information provided in the Search the Collection results on this website in parallel with this text.

View all known portraits for John Carnac