William Warren Porter

Second son. Followed his father into the priesthood; became a fellow of his father’s college, St John’s Oxford.

Online description accompanying lot 161 at an auction in the UK in 2008:

Porter ( Rev . William Warren, 1776-1804 ). A collection of drawings and watercolours, mostly rural landscapes, including many views of Oxford from the surrounding countryside, similar views of Blenheim, Pangbourne, also the Dashwood family home of Well Vale in Lincolnshire, several views of individual Oxford colleges, including St John's, Goodrich and Warwick castles, also a few classical subjects, including 2 relating to the Mysteries of Udelpho, 39 drawings, variously pen and ink or pencil, many with added washes, a few finished watercolours, v.s., some signed or initialled on verso, or with annotations by Mary Ann Street (the artist's sister) ; also with title, list of subscribers, and 5 plates only, (?of 9), for Engravings from Drawings of the Late Rev. William Warren Porter, including The Death of Cicero, by S.W. Reynolds, and 4 rural landscapes by Letitia Burn, J. Riffe and J. Landseer , engravings and a mezzotint, most in mounts, the rest disbound with lower cover of the original blue paper wrapper, oblong folio, J. Tyler, 1806; also with 3 19th century photographs of properties relating the Street family mill at Countess Weir, near Exeter, and another of a church (Qty)

Provenance: By descent from the artist, through the family of his sister Mary Ann Street (née Porter). William Warren Porter was one of five children of Moses Porter and Katherine Lockman. He studied at Oxford, was ordained into the C. of E., and became a fellow of St John's College. At some point he was also appointed tutor to the Dashwood family at Well Vale in Lincolnshire. His love of the classics, the picturesque and, in particular, of Oxford is reflected in this substantial, but nevertheless intimate, group of drawings. According to the preface to the 'Engravings from Drawings', he was constantly sketching whenever not at his studies, observing the landscape with a keen eye for the picturesque. The publication itself stands as testament to the great promise that was to remain unfulfilled, and very high regard in which he was already nevertheless held by his peers, as this talented artist's life was cut short by 'rapid consumption', in 1804, when he was only 28 years old.