Charles Gough (artist)

Charles Gough
Charles Gough
	1829 painting, Attachment, by Edwin Landseer, imagining the scene of Gough's death
Born	1784
Died	April 1805; Red Tarn, Helvellyn, Lake District

Charles Gough (1784 – April 1805) was an artist of the early English romantic movement in the 18th and 19th centuries. He did not achieve significant fame in his lifetime, but after his mysterious death in 1805, he became seen as a martyr, and an icon of the romantic vision. The story of his death was visualised by some of the leading poets and artists of the period.

Death

Striding Edge is a sharp arête providing an adventurous route up Helvellyn

.

Gough was a tourist visiting the

Carlisle

newspaper to report that

The bitch had pupped in a
furze near the body of her master, and, shocking to relate, had torn the cloaths from his body and eaten him to a perfect skeleton.^[2]

Another report suggested that Gough had been eaten by ravens.[3]

Mystery surrounded the circumstances of Gough's death, not only as to how he had died but why he had attempted the dangerous ascent of Helvellyn without a guide. Gough had been contracted by a local artist to copy drawings, but was renowned for being adventurous to the point of taking dangerous risks.

Tirril near Penrith, Cumbria.^[4]

Impact

The nature of Gough's death, in search of the romantic ideal and subsequently guarded by his dog inspired both poets and artists to interpret the scene and so elevate Gough to the level of a martyr to the romantic vision. Such interpretations stressed man's bond with nature, as represented by the faithful dog contrasted with the wildness and savagery of the landscape that caused his death.

Royal Academy in 1830, accompanied by the poem Helvellyn, written about the death by Sir Walter Scott.^[5] William Wordsworth also produced a poem describing the scene, entitled Fidelity.^[6] Wordsworth lived in the lakes, and had brought both Scott and the chemist Humphry Davy to see the spot where Gough's body was found.^[1]

Gough's demise was investigated by Simon Morley in The Unfortunate Tourist of Helvellyn,[1] and is commemorated today in an ale brewed by the Tirril Brewery entitled 'Charles Gough's Old Faithful'.^[4]

Notes

^ ^a ^b ^c Dimbleby. A Picture of Britain. pp. 43–4.
^ ^a ^b ^c ^d ^e Jones, Jonathan (15 March 2003). "The Romantics and the myth of Charles Gough". The Guardian. Retrieved 25 November 2008.
^ ^a ^b ^c ^d ^e ^f Herbert, Ian (13 March 2003). "Wordsworth Trust sheds new light on dark legend of the Lakes". The Independent. Retrieved 25 November 2008.^{[dead link]}
^ ^a ^b "Old Faithful". Carrick's of Penrith. Retrieved 17 February 2011.
^ ^a ^b Bowron. Best in Show. pp. 62–3.
^ Wordsworth. Memoirs of William Wordsworth. p. 315.