6492

DESTROYED 

Countess of Onslow, née the Honourable Violet Marcia Catherine Warwick Bampfylde; wife of 5th Earl 1929

Full-length slightly to the right and looking to the left, seated on a green upholstered chair with gold carved finials, wearing a sleeveless black evening dress and a long turquoise necklace, a lorgnette in her right hand, her left raised to her breast

Oil on canvas, 166.4 x 99.1 cm (65 ½ x 39 in.)

Inscribed lower left: de László / 1929 May

Laib L15531 (782) / C21 (9)  

NPG Album 1927-29, p. 19

Sitters’ Book II, f. 60: Violet Onslow. August 1st 1928

This is one of  relatively few full-length portraits de László painted after the First World War. The composition he adopted is reminiscent of that of the portrait of the Countess of Ancaster [6631], painted in 1911, although the reference to Joshua Reynolds’s Mrs Siddons as the Tragic Muse^[1] is less overt in the present work.

The Countess of Onslow’s portrait is also representative of the green and gold colour scheme the artist used frequently in the late 1920s. When exhibited at the French Gallery, her portrait was noted, together with the other large portraits of the Duchess of Northumberland and her young son [6865] and that of Lady Plunket [6693], for which de László used a similar palette. This led the London correspondent of the Yorkshire Post to praise de László’s “elegance of presentation and deft handling of liquid colour, with an opalescent gleam of green or gold in the sweeping brush strokes.”^[2] 

On 22 March 1928, Lord Onslow asked de László whether he would agree to paint his wife: “Lord Onslow is anxious to have a portrait of Lady Onslow and he wonders whether M: László would be able to undertake it?”^[3] The artist painted the Earl in July 1928 [6489] and the Countess should have been portrayed at the same time, but poor health delayed her picture. The artist’s appointment book for 1929 shows that numerous sittings were required to complete this large portrait. It suggests that the countess sat on nine different occasions at least between 3 April and 8 May.^[4] 

Lord Onslow expressed his wife’s satisfaction with her portrait in a letter to the artist, dated 8 May 1929: “My wife has come back very tired, but absolutely delighted. She says the picture is magnificent and she feels a very proud woman to be the subject of so beautiful a work of art. We both thank you 1000 times.”^[5] De László’s correspondence shows that Lord Onslow paid £1365 for her portrait.^[6] 

The Honourable Violet Marcia Catherine Warwick Bampfylde, only daughter of the 3rd Baron Poltimore and the Honourable Margaret Harriet Beaumont, was born on 27 November 1884 in London. On 22 February 1906 she married Richard William Alan Onslow, the son of William Hillier Onslow, 4th Earl of Onslow, and his wife the Honourable Florence Coulston Gardner. Together they had a daughter, Mary, and a son, William Arthur (born 1913).

Shortly after her wedding, Violet Onslow was taken seriously ill in Stockholm. Her husband, who worked for the Foreign Office, was then in post in St Petersburg. He was transferred to Berlin to be closer to her, and in 1909, he returned to England. The couple settled at Clandon Park, Richard Onslow’s ancestral home in Surrey. In 1911 he succeeded his father as 5th Earl of Onslow.

During the First World War, Violet Onslow ran Clandon Park as a military hospital. She opened Clandon Cottage Hospital for homeless children from London, and was appointed Commandant, in charge of the Voluntary Aid Detachment. Most of the rooms at Clandon Park were used as wards until April 1919.  In recognition of her work, she was made an Associate of the Royal Red Cross, a Dame Grand Cross of the Order of St John, and received a C.B.E. Among the collection at Clandon today is a silver centerpiece Lady Onslow received in honour of her wartime work.

After the war, she supervised the renovation and redecoration of Clandon, but as her delicate health did not improve, she spent more and more time at her brother’s estate in Devon.

Lady Onslow died in St Ann’s Bay, Jamaica, on 23 October 1954. She is buried in the family grave at Merrow, in Surrey.

With thanks to Mrs Iris Hawkins for her help in compiling the biography

PROVENANCE:

Acquired by the National Trust, 1956;

Destroyed by fire at Clandon Park, 29th April 2015

EXHIBITED:

•The French Gallery, London, A Series of Portraits and Studies By Philip A. de László, M.V.O., May-June, 1929, no. 30

•The French Gallery, London, A Series of Portraits and Studies By Philip A. de László, M.V.O., July 1929, no. 16

LITERATURE:

•The Yorkshire Post, 23 May 1929

•Chessum, Sophie, and Rowell, Christopher, Clandon Park (National Trust Guide Book), The National Trust, 2002,  p. 81

•DLA114-0165, letter from Lord Onslow to de László, 8 May 1929

•DLA079-0037, letter from Lord Onslow to de László, 20 July 1929

CC 2008