This is one of three studies of shipping located towards the end of the Whitworth Book of Drawings (the others being TG1622 and TG1623) that precede two views of Mulgrave Castle (TG1625 and TG1626). Thomas Girtin (1874–1960) and David Loshak suggested that the shipping studies, and six other sketches of boats in various configurations, were ‘probably made in the neighbourhood of Whitby’, on the North Yorkshire coast, during Girtin’s ‘visit to Mulgrave Castle’, which they dated to 1801 (Girtin and Loshak, 1954, pp.192–93). Susan Morris, in contrast, thought that the shipping studies were made on a hitherto unrecorded trip to ‘the West Country in 1800 or 1801’, citing an inscription on the back of this drawing, which she read as ‘Mount Edgecumbe’, referring to a location near Plymouth in Devon (Morris, 1986, p.21). However, I have found no convincing evidence to support the idea of a second West Country trip, and I am not entirely convinced by the reading of the inscription which may not even be by Girtin. In turn, though I do not agree with Girtin and Loshak’s dating of Girtin’s visit to 1801, the suggestion that most, if not all, all nine of the shipping studies were made on the North Yorkshire coast does seem plausible. In fact, Girtin showed no great interest in naval subjects, certainly in comparison with his contemporary Joseph Mallord William Turner (1775–1851), and I suspect that apart from during his stay at Mulgrave Castle, which I believe took place in 1800, the artist probably only sketched coastal subjects on two occasions: during his trip to the West Country in 1797 and a year earlier on a visit to Northumbria. Indeed, looking at the group of studies as a whole, one is struck by the artist’s indifference to the appearance of the sea, which is generally depicted as a bland, flat surface. In this case, however, the washes of colour are so poor as to raise suspicions about the intervention of another, later hand. Presumably they were added to make the work more attractive to a prospective purchaser – as was also done in A Schooner near the Shore (TG1806) – though in this case the effort has backfired. An earlier legend, now rightly discounted by Girtin and Loshak and others, has it that Girtin travelled to the north east on a collier, but sketches such as this bear no evidence of his ever having even embarked on a vessel (Girtin and Loshak, 1954, p.25). However, whilst some of Girtin’s studies of shipping are so carefully composed as to suggest that they might have been copied from other sources, the messy way in which the foreground ship crosses in front of the larger vessel, partly obscuring it in the process, suggests that it may have been studied from life, albeit from the safety of the land.

(?) 1800

Beached Vessels at Low Tide

TG1622

(?) 1800

Five Craft off the Coast on a Calm Sea

TG1623

(?) 1800

The Ruins of Old Mulgrave Castle

TG1625

(?) 1800

Mulgrave Park and Castle, from near Epsyke Farm

TG1626

(?) 1800

A Schooner near the Shore

TG1806