The Presidents’ Portraitist and Snuff ....

Comes of not doing my homework properly and making an incorrect assumption! I completely missed the most important aspect of that magnificent picture “The Skater”, which I was in awe of when I found it on Wikipedia, as it satisfied many aspects for my post – the mini ice-ages that have occurred over the centuries: here it is recorded in the picture dated 1782, and the fact that the gentleman is so well dressed; the fact that Gilbert Stuart was an artist, presumably English, I had not heard of registered, but only that.

The Skater, 1782, a portrait of William Grant by Gilbert Stuart

Gilbert Stuart is one of America’s greatest portraitists! Did you know it is his portrait of Washington that has been depicted on the one-dollar bill for over a century? Throughout his career Stuart produced portraits of over 1,000 people, including the first six Presidents of the United States.

His work is now found in many celebrated museums in America and England. I have to thank Terro who said that she did not know that Stuart had spent some of his early career in Scotland and England, which triggered me to look a little closer and who exactly this Gilbert Stuart was.

Gilbert Stuart's unfinished 1796 painting of George Washington, also known as The Athenaeum, is his most celebrated and famous work.

Now that I’ve looked a little closer I see too that William Grant, “The Skater”, was fairly influential in North America – he issued the ordinances establishing civil and criminal courts in Quebec, when he was appointed attorney general in 1776 – before being superseded by the formal appointment of James Monk for the post, by the Secretary of State for the American colonies.

Grant returned to England to ultimately excel at being a parliamentary orator, first practising by giving a lucid explanation of Canadian law during the debates over the Quebec Government Bill, as a Member of Parliament in Great Britain.

Both these men, along with many, many others, were intrepidly crossing the Atlantic Ocean in sailing vessels – the first steam ship (that was in fact a hybrid of steam and sail) to cross the Atlantic was only made in 1819. I am absolutely certain that I would not like to have made that journey then. Except that surprisingly travelling by ship or boat was safer than facing the bandits on the highways and byways of land.

The snuff connection here is that Gilbert Stuart’s father, a Scottish immigrant employed in the snuff-making industry, worked in the first colonial Snuff Mill in America, located in the basement of the family homestead, in Rhode Island.

The Gilbert Stuart Birthplace in Saunderstown, Rhode Island

Snuff taking was observed on Columbus’ second journey to the Americas during 1493 – 1496 by the native peoples of Haiti. Snuff, the pulverised powder from tobacco, had already long been in use in the Americas as an ‘entheogen’ (a plant psychoactive substance).

It seems that the idea of ‘curative properties’ helped popularize snuff, when Jean Nicot, the French Ambassador to Portugal, had sent some in 1561 as a medicine to the court of Catherine de Medici to treat her son’s persistent migraines. The genus ‘Nicotiana’ for tobacco was named after Nicot.

Within two hundred years of Columbus’ find on Haiti, snuff was being traded around the world from Europe, to the UK, to northern Europe and on into Russia, across to India, Asia and even China.

Even by the 1600s some were objecting to snuff being taken, while the Pope threatened to excommunicate ‘sniffers’ but the Tsar set a worse punishment – have your nose off. However King Louis XIII was a devout snuff taker. The trend continued some loved it, some hated it – an English doctor, John Hill (1716 – 1775), warned against the cancerous element of snuff.

An Antique Pair of Snuffers, 1888

When I found that Gilbert Stuart’s family worked at a snuff mill in the family home in Rhode Island, it was just after I’d spotted a wonderful snuff box when I was looking at ‘Love Spoons’ for my recent Valentine’s Day post.

Nineteenth century carved walnut treen snuff box

A wooden “Treen” is a generic name for small wooden handmade functional household objects. As it happens there are two tiny villages in the West of Cornwall called ‘Treen’ – “tre” in Cornish means farm or settlement, perhaps the word ‘Treen’ comes from a Celtic derivation – hence the name for something from or for the home.

Is William Grant not as well dressed as the Olympic Skaters??

Dear Mr Postman – everywhere seems to be soaking in rain: we are here, Madeira had the most awful deluges, the Americas don’t seem to be faring much better .. not a good week for you doing your rounds – thanks for being here though. Mum is ok, but we’re not out of the woods yet for her. She’s comfortable and cheerful – and really what more can I ask.

Hilary Melton-Butcher
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