John Doyle (Irish artist)

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John Doyle (H. B.)
sketched in chalk by his son Henry Edward Doyle
Born	1797 (1797) Dublin, Ireland
Died	2 January 1868 (1868-01-03) (aged 70) London, England
Nationality	Irish
Education	Royal Dublin Society
Known for	Political caricature, painting, lithography
Spouse	Marianna Conan
Children	7, including James, Richard, Henry, and Charles

John Doyle (Dublin 1797 – 2 January 1868 London), known by the pen name H. B., was an Irish political cartoonist, caricaturist, painter and lithographer.

Early life and family

He was the eldest son of a Dublin silk mercer, and came from a

Marianna died in 1832, giving birth to their seventh child. Doyle continued to exhibit miniatures until 1835, but by then he was experiencing greater success with his political cartoons, printed using the new reproductive medium of lithography, beginning in 1827. These were issued once a month during parliamentary sessions, and continued for twenty-two years. His caricatures were mostly faithful likenesses of their subjects, with little exaggeration, treated with sarcastic humour, often alluding to popular plays. They were signed with the letters H. B., constructed out of two Js and two Ds, Doyle's own initials. By 1840 he was prosperous enough to afford a fashionable house in

Career

In the 1840s, at the height of his popularity, indices of H.B.'s prints were published in The Times and by the publisher McLean, but his reputation faded. His later prints were gentle in their humour and drawn in a soft, indistinct style. Thackeray said his cartoons, although clever and witty, were too "genteel" to raise more than a gentlemanly smile – "You will never hear any laughing at 'H. B.'" When he died in 1868, his obituary in The Art Journal did not appear until three months after his death, and a posthumous sale of his sketches at Christie's in 1882 was cancelled for lack of buyers. However, he is considered a founder of the school of British cartoon satirists represented by John Leech, John Tenniel, and his son Richard Doyle, which established the style made famous by Punch magazine. The British Museum has over 900 of his drawings in its collections.

Death and legacy

He died at Maida Hill, 2 January 1868, and was buried at West Norwood Cemetery. His sons included the illustrator James William Edmund Doyle (1822–1892); the painter, illustrator and cartoonist Richard Doyle (1824–1883); Henry Edward Doyle, (1827–1892) who became director of the National Gallery of Ireland; and the painter Charles Altamont Doyle (1832–1893), through whom he was a grandfather of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, the novelist and creator of Sherlock Holmes.^{[1][2][3][4][5][6]}

Gallery

• 
  A trip to Dover, the

  Lord Brougham

  
  17 October 1839
• 
  The lion and the mouse,
  1844, depicting Daniel O'Connell and John Russell, 1st Earl Russell, Pushkin Museum.
• 
  Bleeding extraordinary! Or the great phlebotomist operating for the benefit of the constitution,
  1843, Pushkin Museum
• 
  The modern Cromwell,
  16 July 1843, Pushkin Museum

References

Further reading

• Richard Scully, Eminent Victorian Cartoonists, Volume I: The Founders (London: The Political Cartoon Society, 2018).
• G. M. Trevelyan, The Seven Years of William IV. A Reign Cartooned by John Doyle (London: The Avalon Press, 1952).

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to John Doyle.

• "NPG 2140; John Doyle".
  National Portrait Gallery
  . Retrieved 6 November 2007. John Doyle by Henry Edward Doyle portrait in chalk
• University of Nottingham Digital Gallery includes John Doyle cartoons
• Cartoons by John Doyle at the British Cartoon Archive