John Seabrook
Framed: HOA: 41 1/2″; WOA: 36″
John inherited Dungaroon Plantation from his father, and later owned Oakwell Plantation in Hanover County. Like his father, he invested in downtown Richmond real estate and developed the Seabrook Tobacco Warehouse in Shockoe Bottom. He served as a member of the Richmond Town Council, an elder of the Presbyterian Church in Richmond, and a trustee of the Washington-Henry Academy in Hanover County.
ARTIST: William Hodgson (1748-1806) was a London-born artist who emigrated to Virginia during the Revolutionary War. Previously called “The Payne Limner”—based on ten surviving portraits of the Payne family—he worked in Richmond and the surrounding counties of Henrico, Hanover, and Goochland in the late 18th and early 19th centuries. Approximately 18 of his works are now known. None of these works bears a signature or date, and the attributions are based on the strong stylistic similarities among the various portraits. The discovery of a portrait of Elizabeth Christian Humber (d.1835) (MESDA acc. 5984.1), Hodgson’s daughter’s mother-in-law cemented the attribution.
DESCRIPTION; An oil on canvas, three-quarter length portrait of a young boy of approximatley thirteen years of age holding a long rifle in his left hand while petting a dog with his right hand. A powder horn and a leather shot bag lay on the table to the right and in the background is mountainous scenery with the profile of a squirrel on the tree.
