John Cox Dillman Engleheart, Portrait of James Temple Mansel, 1813

Chicago:

Maggie Keenan, “John Cox Dillman Engleheart, Portrait of James Temple Mansel, 1813,” catalogue entry in Aimee Marcereau DeGalan, Blythe Sobol, and Maggie Keenan, The Starr Collection of Portrait Miniatures, 1500–1850: The Collections of the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, vol. 2, ed. Aimee Marcereau DeGalan (Kansas City: The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, 2024), https://doi.org/10.37764/8322.5.1400.

MLA:

Keenan, Maggie. “John Cox Dillman Engleheart, Portrait of James Temple Mansel, 1813,” catalogue entry. Aimee Marcereau DeGalan, Blythe Sobol, and Maggie Keenan. The Starr Collection of Portrait Miniatures, 1500–1850: The Collections of the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, edited by Aimee Marcereau DeGalan, vol. 2, Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, 2024. doi: 10.37764/8322.5.1400.

See the artist’s biography in volume 4.

Against a vibrant background of cerulean blue and plum purple shines the youthful face of James Temple Mansel (1802–1880).¹ John Cox Dillman Engleheart, or JCD for brevity, was twenty-nine when he painted this portrait; Mansel was just ten or eleven.² The year 1813 was a significant one for the artist, as it marked the retirement of his uncle and teacher, George Engleheart (1750–1829). JCD had established his practice in 1801 when his family moved to London, but his output of miniatures in 1813 was pivotal to establishing his reputation and filling the void his uncle left in the field of portraiture.

JCD depicts Mansel in a rich blue coat and a high, frilled white collar with narrow accordion pleats, the ends of which are marked with opaque white dots. The linear strokes in Mansel’s collar repeat in the slight waves of his hair, which hangs naturally across his forehead.³ His attire suggests he is a well-dressed scholar or gentleman, but his delicate eyebrows and petite nose are reminders of his tender age.

James Temple Mansel was born on July 24, 1802, the eldest son of Mansel Dawkin Mansel (1763–1823) of Lathbury Manor and Elizabeth (née Browne) Mansel.⁴ Much like JCD did in relation to his uncle, James Temple Mansel lived in the shadow of his father, who acted as the county’s high sheriff and deputy lieutenant and even hosted King Louis XVIII of France at the family’s residence between 1809 and 1814.⁵ Despite his prominence and attendant prestige, Mansel Dawkin struggled with his mental health and ultimately took his own life on August 11, 1823.⁶ His widow, Elizabeth, died fourteen days later. At twenty-one years old, James Mansel assumed the role of family patriarch for his younger siblings.⁷

On the heels of his family’s misfortunes, James left Lathbury Manor to attend Christ Church College at Oxford in 1825, and he received his Master’s of Divinity two years later.⁸ He married Mable Burke in Paris on February 9, 1832, and they had five children together.⁹ While living in France, Mansel was appointed minister of St. Servan’s English Chapel.¹⁰ Although he was an admirable preacher, one parishioner noted that “she thought him not ‘energetic’ enough for the poor,” and indeed, this miniature suggests a boy of great wealth and reserve.¹¹ Nonetheless, the last position he held in the church was chaplain of inmates at Bristol’s Bridewell House of Correction.¹² The Reverend James Mansel died on February 1, 1880, after many years of service to his community, family, and church.¹³

This portrait is reminiscent of George Engleheart’s Portrait of a Boy in the sitter’s doe-eyed gaze and puckered lips, but it diverges in many other aspects, from the boy’s age and choice of attire to the degree of finish. Whereas George Engleheart’s portrait is loose and fluid, almost appearing unfinished, JCD’s portrait pays careful attention to the direction and spacing of brushstrokes. No longer working under or alongside his uncle,¹⁴ JCD asserted his talent in a market in which he did not have to compete with his more established uncle. Much like his sitter’s father, Mansel Dawkin, JCD struggled with mental health, and perhaps he saw a bit of himself in the young James Temple Mansel.¹⁵ Despite the fast-approaching clouds in the background of this portrait, Mansel calmly stares ahead and faces life’s unknowns, as John Cox Dillman Engleheart did himself.

Notes

1. I would like to thank Cara Nordengren, PhD candidate, The Kress Foundation Department of Art History, University of Kansas, Lawrence, for her biographical research on James Temple Mansel.

2. While a portrait miniature of Mansel’s father also exists, it is unknown whether Engleheart was the artist. See Charles Maunsell and Edward Stratham, History of the Family of Maunsell (Mansell, Mansel) (London: Kegan Paul Trench, 1917), 2:138.

3. A similar approach to the white pleats and hair appears in another 1813 portrait by JCD; see A Young Gentleman, watercolor on ivory, 3 5/16 in. (8.3 cm) high, in “Fine Portrait Miniatures,” Bonhams, London, November 17, 2004, lot 140.

4. “James Temple Mansel,” England, Births and Christenings, 1538–1975, FHL film number: 1042387, digitized on Ancestrylibrary.com. Mansel was baptized on August 8, 1802, in Lathbury, Buckingham, England.

5. Maunsell and Stratham, History of the Family of Maunsell, 151; Mansel’s role as Commissioner of the French Emigration Committee involved looking after Louis, his staff, and other important French immigrants. As a gift for his kindness and entertainment, Mansel was given a gold snuffbox with the king’s portrait painted on the lid.

6. According to James Sheahan, History and Topography of Buckinghamshire: Comprising a General Survey of the County, Preceded by an Epitome of the Early History of Great Britain (London: Longman, Green, Longman, and Roberts, 1862), 551: “He committed suicide, in a fit of temporary derangement.”

7. National Archives, “Letters of administration of estate of Elizabeth Mansel of Lathbury House, Bucks., widow, granted to son James Temple Mansel,” August 1823, London Metropolitan Archives, ACC/1430/038. Before her death, Elizabeth left James the Lathbury estate.

8. “Academic Register: Oxford, January 27, 1825,” Oxford Quarterly Magazine 1 (March and June 1825): 2; A Catalogue of All Graduates in Divinity, Law, Medicine, Arts and Music, Who Have Regularly Proceeded or Been Created in the University of Oxford, between October 10, 1659 and December 31, 1850 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1851), 2:434; Maunsell and Stratham, “Dawkin-Mansel Pedigree,” History of the Family of Maunsell, opp. p. 148. Mansel’s siblings included George Barclay, who married Jane Bell, and Charles Grenville, a distinguished Indian Civil Service official who married Anna Mary O’Ryan.

9. William Henry Mansel (1835–1852) and another son, Mabel Mansel (1836?–1851), (Sarah?) Elizabeth (1837?–1844), and Mary Frances Mansel (1841–1851). “Mable” is also spelled “Mabel.”

10. Crockford’s Clerical Directory for 1868: Being a Biographical and Statistical Book of Reference for Facts Relating to the Clergy and the Church, no. 4 (London: Horace Cox, 1868), 437–38.

11. Mary Beacock Fryer, Elizabeth Postuma Simcoe, 1762–1850 (Toronto: Dundurn Press, 1989), 227.

12. Postal and Commercial Directory of the City of Bristol, and County of Glamorgan (London: Webster, 1865), 30; he served from 1850 to 1865.

13. “Manse, The Reverend James Temple,” National Probate Calendar (London: Principal Probate Registry, 1882), 44.

14. See, for example, Portrait of a Naval Officer, Possibly Rear Admiral Cuthbert Collingwood, 1802, which JCD painted under his uncle’s name and signature.

15. See JCD’s self-portrait, completed at the age of twenty-one: Self-Portrait, ca. 1805, watercolor on ivory, 3 1/8 x 2 3/8 in. (8 x 6 cm), private collection, illustrated in Roger and Carmela Arturi Phillips, “The True and Flawed Genius of John Engleheart (1784–1862),” in Portrait Miniatures: Artists, Functions and Collections, ed. Bernd Pappe and Juliane Schmieglitz-Otten (Petersberg: Michael Imhof and the Tansey Miniatures Foundation, 2018), 199.

Possibly with a member of the Mansel family, by 1917 [1];

Elsie Gertrude Kehoe (1888–1967), Saltdean, Sussex, by June 15, 1950 [2];

Purchased from her sale, Objects of Vertu, Fine Watches, Etc., Including The Property of Mrs. W. D. Dickson; also Fine Portrait Miniatures Comprising The Property of Mrs. Kehoe, Sotheby’s, London, June 15, 1950, lot 161, as James Temple Mansell, by Leggatt Brothers, London, probably on behalf of Mr. John W. (1905–2000) and Mrs. Martha Jane (1906–2011) Starr, Kansas City, MO, 1950–1958 [3];

Their gift to The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, MO, 1958.

Notes

[1] The portrait miniature likely belonged to a family member when it was illustrated in the book History of the Family of Maunsell (Mansell, Mansel) in 1917. The only information provided with the illustration is, “James Temple Mansel. Eldest Son of Mansel Dawkin Mansel.” A family member, Charles Albert Maunsell, wrote the book. He writes that a snuffbox, given to James Temple Mansel’s father, is in the collection of Colonel Charles Grenville Mansel (1850–1940), the nephew of James Temple Mansel (by his brother, also called Charles Grenville Mansel, who died in 1886). James had five children who also could have inherited the portrait: William Henry Mansel (1835–1852) and another son, Mabel Mansel (1836?–1851), (Sarah?) Elizabeth (1837?–1844), and Mary Frances Mansel (1841–1851).

[2] Elsie Gertrude Noble married Bartle Charles Philip Kehoe (1886–1949) in 1913 in Salford, Lancashire. The couple lived at 29 Harrington Gds., South Kensington in 1927, 1 Royal Crescent, Marine Parade, Brighton in 1929, and Roedean Crescent, “Four Winds” in 1939. Bartle’s job was, “managing director public works contractor.” Elsie and Bartle traveled internationally; passenger lists show they traveled from Genoa, Italy, to Southampton in December 1927 and again in November 1929 (they were away for about a month in 1929). Bartle’s profession is also listed as, “Civil Engineer,” “Director,” and “Director Coy.” All according to records found on Ancestrylibrary.com. They do not appear to have had children. Bartle died November 2, 1949. According to his will, his effects were £10,665. See UK Probate Search: Kehoe, 1950, p. 26, https://probatesearch.service.gov.uk/Calendar?surname=kehoe&yearOfDeath=1950#calendar. Elsie died at 60 Greenways Ovingdean, Brighton on December 16, 1967. Her effects totaled £9,738.

Martha Jane Starr’s correspondence to her friend, Betty Hogg, from March 22, 1949: “A Mrs. Kehoe is a collector over there [London] and I was referred to her last year and just recently she mailed me a catalogue from Agnew with the sale prices of miniatures paid and some fine ones went very reasonably in comparison with American prices. If the distance isn’t too great perhaps you could phone or contact her for her opinion on the numbers and portraits I’m listing.” An undated letter from Mrs. Hogg, following an auction “. . . your lots 25 and 48 had me worried they seemed so popular! I did not call Mrs. Kehoe for I thought she might be a competitor and bid against me!!” The Starrs mentioned them in Antiques magazine in 1961: “A Mr. and Mrs. Kehoe of Brighton gave us gracious hospitality while showing us theirs [collection of miniatures].” Page 440.

[3] “James Temple Mansell, by John Dillman Engleheart, signed and dated 1813, it portrays James Temple Mansell as a boy, nearly full face, in white frilled collar and rich blue coat, cloud and sky background, hair at back, oval, 3 1/4 in. James Temple Mansell was the eldest son of Mansell Dawkin Mansell, of Lothbury Park, Newport Pagnell, Bucks. And the Miniature in question is illustrated in The History of the Family Maunsell, vol. II.” According to an attached price list, Leggatt bought lot 161 for £38. Archival research has shown that Leggatt Brothers served as purchasing agents for the Starrs. See correspondence between Betty Hogg and Martha Jane Starr, May 15 and June 3, 1950, Nelson-Atkins curatorial files.

Charles Albert Maunsell and Edward Phillips Stratham, History of the Family of Maunsell (Mansell, Mansel) (London: K. Paul, 1917), 2:137.

Catalogue of Objects of Vertu, Fine Watches, Etc., Including The Property of Mrs. W. D. Dickson; also Fine Portrait Miniatures Comprising The Property of Mrs. Kehoe (London: Sotheby’s, June 15, 1950), 21, as James Temple Mansell.

Ross E. Taggart, ed., Handbook of the Collections in the William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art and Mary Atkins Museum of Fine Arts, 4th ed. (Kansas City, MO: William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art and Mary Atkins Museum of Fine Arts, 1959), 264, as James Temple Mansell.

Ross E. Taggart, The Starr Collection of Miniatures in the William Rockhill Nelson Gallery (Kansas City, MO: Nelson Gallery-Atkins Museum, 1971), no. 207, p. 70, (repro.), as James Temple Mansell.