6437

Captain Ian Theodore Nelson 1916

Half-length slightly to the left, his head turned full face to the viewer and looking right, wearing service dress of the 4th Cameron Highlanders, a beret and Sam Browne belt, a greatcoat over his shoulders

Oil on canvas, [dimensions unknown]

Inscribed lower right: László / LONDON / 1916 XII 29

Laib L8331(789) / C20(19) Captain V. [sic] Nelson

NPG Album 1912-16, p. 42, where labelled by the artist: Captain Nelson, Edinburgh 1916

Sitters’ Book II, f. 8: Ian T. Nelson. Decr. 29th. 1916.

Private Collection

This portrait is typical of those that de László was commissioned to paint during the First World War of officers soon destined for the front. These were typically painted in one or two sittings of about two hours and that of Captain Maurice Trouton [7521] is inscribed “during one sitting.” He charged a reduced fee of £100 for these portraits.

The sitter wrote to de László after taking delivery of the portrait at his home in Randolph Crescent, Edinburgh: “The picture has now been here for a little over a week & there has been time for most of my relations to see it. They are delighted with it, my wife particularly so. I had always imagined that to sit for one’s portrait must be a very slow & tiresome business but I must say I did not find it so in the very least. From start to finish it was so quick & I found myself so interested in the whole thing that the time passed exceedingly quickly & pleasantly & I now look back with real pleasure on the hours spent in your studio. I am today sending you one of the photos of the picture as you asked me to.”^[1] 

De László painted the sitter’s elder brother Thomas [6433] in service dress, in October 1916, shortly before he was killed in battle and his sister-in-law Margaret in March 1917 [6436].  

Ian Theodore Nelson was born 11 June 1878, the son of Thomas Nelson (1822-1882), of St Leonard’s, Edinburgh and his wife Janet Kemp (1847-1919). During the First World War he served with the 4th Cameron Highlanders and his elder brother Captain Thomas Arthur Nelson was killed at Arras in 1917. Their grandfather, Thomas Nelson, founded the publishing house Thomas Nelson & Sons in 1798 and Ian Nelson served as Chairman from 1916-1958.

On 4 June 1908 he married Vera Mandeville (died 1962), daughter of Arthur and Seline Mary Mandeville of Hobart, Australia. They had one child, Ronald (born 1917), and lived at Netherdale House, Banff, in Scotland. Unlike his elder brother, who was an extrovert, Ian Nelson was a shy man and enjoyed countryside pursuits such as fishing, shooting and deer stalking.^[2] 

Ian Nelson died 14 April 1958 at Netherdale, Aberdeenshire.

PROVENANCE:

By descent in the family of the sitter

LITERATURE:

DLA049-0017, letter from Captain Ian Nelson to de László, 22 January 1917

KF 2021