767. Two Studies by Charles Shannon at the National Gallery of Art

There are, according to the museum's website, two studies by Charles Shannon in the collection of the National Gallery of Art in Washington. One depicts Atlas, for an unknown painting; the second work is one of a series of chalk studies for a painting of 'The Good Samaritan', dated 1918. No painting with this title has survived, but after Shannon died in 1937, a large series of chalk and coloured drawings on the subject were sold.

Charles Shannon, study for 'The Good Samaritan', signed 'CS 1918'
[National Gallery of Art, Washington DC]
[Creative Commons CC0 1.0 Universal Public Domain Dedication]

Sotheby's 1939 sale was recorded in the Catalogue of Fine Paintings by Old Masters and Modern Drawings (London, Sotheby’s, 14 June 1939) when the property of 'C.H. Shannon, R.A. (decd.)' was sold by order of the executors. Lot number 8 was described - briefly - as 'The Good Samaritan at the Inn Door', the coloured design[,] Thirteen various Studies[,] Chalks'. The lot was sold for £6 5s to Martin Birnbaum, an American dealer and art critic who had been a longtime friend of Ricketts and Shannon.

This particular study of two male figures for the 'Good Samaritan' was acquired by William Henry Donner in Montreux in the late 1930s (this is what the museum's website tells us, but possibly Donner acquired it in the early 1940s). the study went to his daughter, Dora Donner Ide and, in 1999, Mr. and Mrs. John Jay Ide from San Francisco donated the drawing to the National Gallery of Art.

766. The Real Name of Thom Winslow

Many names and dates mentioned in the previous two blog posts need correcting. Names have been misspelled in various publications and on websites, and birth years and even nationalities have been mixed up. But I think we’ve sorted it out. The solution began to emerge thanks to an email from Martin Steenson of Books & Things in London (here is the the shop's website): 'I would have thought there is a possibility that Mrs Winslow (nee Thomas) had a nickname of Thom.'

To get straight to the point: that’s correct. Mrs Henry Winslow must be the ‘Thom’ to whom Ricketts gave this copy of Beyond the Threshold as a gift upon its publication.

Charles Ricketts, dedication to 'Thom Winslow'
in Beyond the Threshold (1929)

The name Marius Winslow appears as an owner's entry at the front of the book. 

Martin Steenson found the name of Marius Winslow on a genealogy website (Ancestry). There, the name is linked to Florian Carr, which was the name taken by the Winslows’ daughter after her second marriage. She was apparently his ‘probate’. 

The website states that his name is Marius Kempton Winslow, and that he was born in 1917 and died on 20 December 1959 (the English & Wales, Civil Registration Death Index, 1916-2007 corroborates this date). That would explain the later gift of a painting to the Ashmolean Museum 'in memory of Helen, Henry and Marius Winslow' in 1975, undoubtedly by the same Florian Carr.

However, the site introduces an error about Florian, stating that she was the elder 'son' of the Winslows, born on 17 March 1914. (All dates on this website are questionable.) Of course, Florian was their only daughter. The mother is introduced as 'Helen Sterling' (1880-1943). This cannot be correct. Sterling was not her family name, it was her middle name. She was not born in 1880 in Cleveland, and in 1960 was very much alive, when she was mentioned in a note about deaths in The Times of 13 January 1960: 

On 9th January, 1960, suddenly, at his house in Switzerland, Henry Winslow, husband of Helen Sterling. 

This is supported by a notice in the 'In Memoriam' section of The Times, dated 30 January 1976:

WINSLOW. - In memory of Helen Sterling Winslow, painter in tempera, died 28th January, 1973.

These notices tell us that Henry Winslow did not die in 1953 or 1955, as several sources including the British Museum assert, but in 1960. We still have to assume that he was born in 1875.

The names of both children and their mother can be found in The New York Times of 31 October 1936:

The New York Times, 31 October 1936

Helen Sterling Wilson was the sister of Gertrude S. Thomas who died on 2 October 1935. There were to be two trust funds for 'Florian Winslow Johnstone [...] and Marius Winslow', niece and nephew of the deceased. From this we can conclude that Helen was not a British painter born in 1890, but an American. The genealogy of the Thomas family has partially been published in The Sterling Genealogy by Albert Mack Sterling (New York: The Grafton Press, 1909). Gertrude Streator Thomas and Helen Sterling Thomas were children of Helen Gertrude Streator and Eben B. Thomas, the former a descendent of William Sterling of Haverhill, Mass., the latter a railroad manager who became president of the Lehigh Valley Railway system. Gertrude was born on 5 June 1873, Helen was born on 18 November 1877. 

Around 1900 she published stories, and kept doing so, see for example 'The Heart's Desire in Blue Sky (May 1900), 'The Wonder-Worker' in Scribner's Magazine (August 1914) and the 'Tytgat the Toy-Man' (in the same, June 1921).

The New York Times of 2 September 1911 carried a notice on 'Marriage':

WINSLOW - THOMAS. - In Paris, France. Sept. 1. Helen Sterling, daughter of Mr. and Mrs E.B. Thomas, to Henry Winslow.

Helen Sterling Thomas was in her early thirties when she married in Paris, and apparently the couple moved to London shortly afterwards, where their daughter and son were born. At around that time she turned to etching and painting. Her middle name was spelled 'Stirling' by herself on some of her paintings, such as 'Pieta' (Christie's auction 2008), which helped to create confusion.

Signature of Helen Sterling Winslow on 'Pieta' (undated tempera painting)

In short, Henry Winslow (c.1875-1960) was an American painter, who went to art school in Paris where he may have met Helen Sterling Thomas (1877-1973). She was an American author and painter whose nickname may have been Thom. This would explain Ricketts's dedication to the American painter: 'To Thom Winslow | This Victorian masterpiece | From its | British author'. 

The Winslows owned at least two paintings by Ricketts, 'The Trojan Women', donated by the Winslows to the Manchester Art Gallery in 1948 and 'Jephthah's Daughter' which was presented by them to the Ashmolean Museum in 1946. They had lent these paintings to the memorial exhibition for Ricketts in 1933, which also included four designs for stage costumes from their collection: drawings for 'A Winter's Tale', a costume for Siegmund and two designs for Shaw's 'Saint Joan'. The Winslows also had acquired paintings by Charles Shannon: 'Toilet Scene I' and 'Toilet Scene II', both given to Manchester Art Gallery, also in 1948. Both artists and collectors must have been close to Ricketts's heart. Ricketts oversaw the interior design of their St John's Wood house. In January 1929 he trusted them with news about Shannon after his accident so that he himself would not be bothered too much in the stressful situation. To Thomas Sturge Moore he wrote:

Dont write I find letters upsetting. News is given to friends at about 12 oc at the 'phone Primrose Hill 0570. The Winslows are kept informed.

Sturge Moore saw to it that two of Ricketts's stories in his posthumous Unrecorded Histories were dedicated to Henry and Helen Winslow.

765. More on the Winslows?

By April 1938, Helen and Henry Winslow had donated a Japanese artwork to the British Museum in memory of Charles Ricketts. The museum gives the following description:

Amida sanzon raigo zu 阿弥陀三尊来迎図
Painting, hanging scroll mounted as a panel. Amida standing on lotus pedestal, his hands in mudra, and halo with fifteen rays of light; on left Seishi kneeling on lotus pedestal, hands clasped in prayer; on right Kannon on lotus pedestal holding lotus pedestal for the worshipper. Ink, colours and gold on silk.

'Amida sanzon raigo zu'
British Museum
Museum number1938,0108,0.1
© The Trustees of the British Museum
[Shared under a Creative Commons Attribution
-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International
(CC BY-NC-SA 4.0) licence]

The painting (124.40 by 56.30 cm) dates from the fourteenth century and was in the collection of Baron Kawasaki Shozo, which was dispersed at auction in 1928. The Winslows purchased in at the sale, and probably decided to donate it to the BM after Ricketts's own collection had been bequeathed to the Museum from the estate of Charles Shannon.

The pair had a daughter, called Florian, or Ann. She married Thomas Julian Johnstone on 11 May 1935. On 20 September 1951 she married Charles Francis Carr. Later in life she lived on Guernsey. Florian Carr died on 2 May 2007.

In 1973, after Helen Winslow had died, Florian Carr donated some wood-engravings by Ricketts to the V&A. These were proofs of 'Psyche in the House' and 'The Flight of Cupid' (on Chinese paper, numbered '2'), published in the Vale Press edition of Apuleius, De Cupidinis et Psyches amoribus fabula anilis (1901).

We might assume that Florian Carr was also involved in a posthumous exhibition of her father's work in the Gerald M. Norman Gallery in Duke Street in February 1975: 'Henry Winslow (Whistler's pupil)'. Winslow was born exactly one hundred years earlier.

She certainly contacted the British Museum to provide biographical information about her father: 

Draughtsman and printmaker. b.Boston, trained at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts in Paris. For a time a pupil of Whistler. Large collection in MFA, Boston (Information from Mrs C F Carr, a descendant in 2004).

It is likely that the life dates in the BM database are also based on her information: 1875-1953 (*). She left sixteen Japanese woodblock prints to the Ashmolean Museum. Her name was mentioned as Florian (Winslow) Carr. She also supported the London Library, enabling 'major building improvement'.

However, the sources – newspapers, museum and library websites, etc. – never mention Thom Winslow’s name. For now, he remains an enigma.

Henry Winslow's Poems

In 1953, Henry Winslow's book Poems was issued in Locarno, probably a posthumous publication, intended for his friends. 

Henry Winslow, Poems (1953)

It seems that Winslow wrote these poems towards the end of his life, as he was losing his sight. There are a few dedications, but none to his wife or child(ren). The poetry offers no insight into his family life, apart from his love for Helen.

What brought you on that day you sat for me?

Although I strove so hard to draw your head

Without a flaw, I could not ever see

Aught save those eyes of yours [...]

Still in my studio the drawing lies,

Begun but never finished, save the eyes.

(p. 28)

In another poem, he argues that he gave his heart and soul away, like the fool of fools:

                             and found a heart more brave,

A soul more tender, true; so I was wise

For all my folly, winning such a prize.

(p. 40)

The question remains: who is Thom Winslow, who, in 1929, received a dedication copy of Ricketts's Beyond the Threshold?

(*) For correct dates and names, please see blog No. 766: 'The Real Name of Thom Winslow'.