Harden, John (1772-1847)
A talented amateur artist and a generous and sympathetic host to artists, writers and other visitors to the Lakes for the three decades of his residence at Brathay Hall, John Harden was born in County Tipperary and was a man of private means; he is sometimes described as a lawyer but the evidence on this has been doubted and he was certainly never in practice. He spent his youth in Dublin, showing an aptitude for sketching and copying paintings, and made his earliest known visit to the Lake District in 1798. In 1800 he married but his happiness was soon cut short by the death of his wife. To recover from this blow amidst congenial company he took himself to Bath where he soon met Farington; they were in almost daily contact throughout January and February 1801, Harden showing the older artist his sketchbook and talking about his future plans (IV. 1477-508 passim). They met again in London in May (IV.1545, 1550). These meetings may well have contributed to Harden’s decision to revisit the Lakes in September of that year, an excursion which had a delightful outcome: on his return voyage from Holyhead to Bray in Ireland he met his future second wife, Jessy Allan of Edinburgh. They married in January 1803, spent three months in the Lakes that summer (sometimes going out sketching together) and decided to make the area their home. In April 1804 they heard they could rent Brathay and by June had taken up residence. They were to remain there – with absences in Edinburgh, Dublin and elsewhere – for the best part of 31 years, bringing up a family of children, sketching when they could and having contact with many artists: both residents like Ibbetson, Green and Mary Dixon and summer visitors from both north (H.W. Williams) and south (Constable, Havell, Reinagle and Farington). The Hardens’ early years at Brathay are documented in the journals sent by Jessy in 1801-11 to her sister Agnes who had accompanied her husband, a military surgeon, to India on a ten-year period of service. In 1834 the Brathay estate was sold by its owner and the Harden family moved to Field Head House, north of Hawkshead, where Jessy died in 1837.
The Hardens played a full part in local society as kindly hosts and amiable, cultured guests. For a time their eldest daughter attended Miss Dowling’s school in Ambleside with Dora Wordsworth, their sons were taught by Hartley Coleridge, and there was easy intercourse between the families. Farington, meeting Harden as a widower in 1801, had referred to him as a man of ‘civil & decorous manners’ (I.147); in the happier days of 1806, with Jessy and their young children, Constable found him high-spirited, ‘Whip Syllebub, & Spruce Beer’, compared with his melancholic neighbour, the poet Charles Lloyd (IX.3491). In 1839 Henry Crabb Robinson referred to him as ‘that good old man with the sunny face’, attributing the phrase to Wordsworth, but perhaps the best tribute comes from Hartley Coleridge to whom Harden had once expounded on the genius and morality of Hogarth: ‘he combined the brilliance of champagne, and the warmth of his compatriot poteen, with the simplicity of water…. JH was both merry and wise, but the best of the moral was himself’ (Blackwood’s Magazine, 1831). (Taken from 'Savage Grandeur & Noblest Thoughts' catalogue, 2010. (AK, 17.12.2011))
The Irish-born John Harden and his Scottish wife Jessy made their home at Brathay Hall near the head of Windermere for some thirty years from 1804 onwards, raising a family and enjoying the friendship of many individuals in the Wordsworth and Coleridge circle. Both John and Jessy were talented amateur artists, John having the leisure to be experimental and prolific, and together they provided intelligent and genial hospitality to many visiting artists including Constable, Havell and Reinagle. Harden is best known today for his delightful interiors, recording domestic activities at Brathay, but he had an equally keen eye for outdoor subjects.
(copied from 'Savage Grandeur' exhibition text)
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