Letitia Elizabeth Landon (Mrs Maclean)

This portraitback to top

L.E.L. was a close friend of Maclise whom she had known for many years before her marriage and departure for the Cape Coast in 1838. According to a letter from Croal Thomson (in NPG archive) her sister modelled for 'Ophelia' in the 'Play Scene from Hamlet'. Maclise painted her on several occasions exhibiting portraits at RA 1830 (513) and Third Exhibition of National Portraits, South Kensington, 1868 (412), the last lent by the artist and described as a half-length miniature size (17 x 14 in) on paper signed with monogram DMcC. A watercolour drawing in the British Museum (Laurence Binyon, Catalogue of Drawings by British Artists … in the British Museum, III, p 86), seated in a blue-grey dress, was used in Fraser's Magazine, VIII, October 1833; an equestrian lithograph and a drawing of her standing by a horse are in the V&A Museum; Maclise also used her as illustrations to F. S. Mahony's Reliques of Father Prout, 1870 edn.

Physical descriptionback to top

Three-quarter-length seated in a plain white dress and belt, and elaborate 1830s hair-style; black hair, dark eyes.

Provenanceback to top

The artist and probably his sale Christie's, 24 June 1870; Mrs Hingston; her daughter Mrs Martin; bought by the NPG from Francis Harvey 1922.

Exhibitionsback to top

'Daniel Maclise', NPG and Dublin, 1972 (40).

Reproductionsback to top

Large stipple by Finden published Fisher and signed L.E.L. Cape Coast Castle October 12 [1838]; a smaller stipple by Thomson in Cooke-Taylor's NPG, IV, 1848 shows her in the same dress but more restrained hair-style; stipple vignette by Finden, three-quarter-length standing in a leafy bower, bonnet and different dress but the same head, published in L.E.L., Poetical Works, 1835, frontispiece, and again in Blanchard's Life and Literary Remains of L.E.L., 1841, I, frontispiece.


This extended catalogue entry is from the out-of-print National Portrait Gallery collection catalogue: Richard Walker, Regency Portraits, National Portrait Gallery, 1985, 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 Letitia Elizabeth Landon (Mrs Maclean)

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