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Social Victorians/People/James Archer

< Social Victorians‎ | People

Also Known As edit

  • Family name: Archer
  • James Archer
  • VIAF 73701377.
  • Signature on his paintings:
    • "[M]ost of Archer's paintings [were] signed with his monogram, JA transfixed by an arrow" (Soden): [img here]
    • Sometimes he apparently signed with his last name: [img here]

Demographics edit

  • Nationality: Scots

Residences edit

  • Born in Edinburgh
  • 21 Lower Phillimore Gardens, Kensington; living there in December 1868, when infant William Kinglake died
  • 7 Cromwell Place, South Kensington (1882 - )
  • Milford, Surrey (1890s)
  • Shean, his home in Haslemere, Surrey (by 1903)
  • Buried in Haslemere (Soden)

Family edit

  • Andrew Archer, dentist
  • Ann Cunningham Gregory Archer (Meldrum)
  1. Sister
  2. Andrew Archer (wrote history of Canada, 1876) (Meldrum)
  3. Georgina Archer (1827–1882) (Soden) ("founder of the Victoria Institute, Berlin, and tutoress of the German Emperor William II, Prince Henry, and Princess Charlotte of Prussia"; Meldrum)
  4. James Archer (10 June 1822 - 3 September 1904)


  • James Archer (10 June 1822 - 3 September 1904)
  • Jane Clerk (Lawson?; daughter of James Lawson) ( - 26 January 1892 ["Deaths (1892)]")
  1. William Kinglake Archer, (12 December 1868 - 17 December 1868)
  2. Amela [?], married 5 August 1882 ("Marriages [1882].") [not clear how many daughters or when Amela was born]
  3. daughter (25 September 1871 - )
  4. daughter

Acquaintances, Friends and Enemies edit

Organizations edit

  • Smashers Sketchers Club, "late 1840s," in Edinburgh (Soden)
  • Royal Scottish Academy, from 1850
  • City of Edinburgh Volunteers (Artists' company), 2nd Lieutenant, 1859–May 1860 (artillery unit formed in case of invasion from France) (Soden)
  • Auld Lang Syne Club, London (largely made up of members of the former Smashers Club), 1863 (Soden)
  • London Scottish Artists, London, 1880s and 1890s, secretary. "This body of expatriate Scots met each year at a dinner held to coincide with the Royal Scottish Academy's banquet at the opening of each year's annual exhibition" (Soden).

Timeline edit

1842, Archer first exhibited a painting, The Child St John in the Wilderness, at the Royal Scottish Academy.

1849, Archer exhibited his first historical painting at the RSA, The Last Supper.

1850, Archer was elected an Associate in the Royal Scottish Academy.

1853, 1 August, James Archer and Jane Clerk married.

1857, 1 June, Monday, an exhibition opened "at the Gallery of Mr. Walesby, 5, Waterloo Place" and ran throughout June in which Archer's The Shadow on the Path was hung ("Royal Association for the Promotion of the Fine Arts in Scotland," p. 2, Col. D).

1858, Archer was elected an Academician in the Royal Scottish Academy.

1859, 9 November, Wednesday, among the "Militia and Rifle Volunteers" is the "Edinburgh City Artillery Militia - William Pounsett, gent., to be second lieutenant, vice Davidson, promoted. 1st Edinburgh (City) Artillery Volunteers - Joseph Noel Paton, Esq., to be captain; John Faed, Esq., to be first lieutenant; James Archer, gent., to be second lieutenant." ("Naval and Military")

1862, the Archers moved to London.

1867, 24 August, Saturday, Archer exhibited (at least) one painting in the Birmingham Society of Artists; the "private view" was on Saturday ("Birmingham Society of Artists").

1868, 17 December, Archer's infant son William Kinglake Archer died ("Deaths [1868]").

1870, 21 February, Monday, the Morning Post reported that a "Mr. James Archer" had arrived at the Grosvenor Hotel, Buckingham Palace-Road ("The Grosvenor Hotel").

1879, June 10, Tuesday, James Archer's painting hung at the Royal Academy, A Sacrifice to Dionysus, did not get a good review ("The Royal Academy [PMG 1879]").

1880, Archer returned to England from India ("The Late James Archer, R.S.A.").

1880, Archer's portrait of Henry Irving as Charles 1 was hung in exhibit at the Fine Arts Gallery, received well.

1880, 31 January, The Graphic reported that on this day an exhibit opened at the Scottish Royal Academy; Archer was "represented by his 'Sacrifice to Dionysius' and his 'Portrait of Herr Joachim'" ("Royal Scottish Academy").

1880, 14 February, Saturday, Archer attended a 100th Performance of the Merchant of Venice and dinner at the Beefsteak Club hosted by Henry Irving, with lots of luminaries, including Oscar Wilde and several lords ("Merchant of Venice").

1882, 5 August, Saturday, Archer's daughter Amela [?] was married at St. Mary Abbotts: <quote>TWEEDLE-ARCHER, — August 5, at St. Mary Abbotts, Kensington, by the Rev. Charles Collins, M.A., uncle of the bride•groom, George Straton Tweedle, youngest son of the late Alexander George Tweedle, Madras Civil Service, and grandson of Alexander Tweedle, M.D., F.R.S., Bute Lodge, Twickenham, and A?ela daughter of James Archer, R.S.A., 7, Cromwell- [place, S.W. ??]</quote> (Marriages [1882]")

1884, Archer visited America, painting Andrew Carnegie.

1886, Archer visited India (Soden).

1886, 1 September, Wednesday, a letter from Archer was quoted in the Pall Mall Gazette, on the subject of reform at the Royal Academy: <quote>MR. JAMES ARCHER, R.S.A. I think the chief difficulty of the case is the clear-seeing of the twofold position of the Academy — first, its actual position as a private body administering its own laws; and next, the position that time and circumstances have given it — a society so well known and acknowledged as the chief representa- tive of the art of the country that it has become what may be called a public body. The greater number of the members seem to cling to their privileges as belonging to a private body, and which they can with reason maintain. Yet if the subject in dispute could be again submitted in a friendly spirit, showing that the giving up of this right of sending eight works (which, after all, very few of the members ever take advantage of) would be rather on their part a recognizing and taking up the high position that time and circumstances have put on them, and, would be in the true sense an increase rather than a decrease in the dignity of the Academy, then I have strong hopes that the artists outside, and that section of the public interested in the subject, would see a solution of the difficulty in the near future. When one hears that several distinguished members, with the President himself at their head, are in favour of this reform, and when we remember how large a proportion of the best art of the country has come from the Academy, these facts should be taken as an additional argument in favour of the subject being approached in no hostile spirit. Should the same crisis ever occur in Scotland in connection with the Royal Scottish Academy, I feel I should recognize the changed conditions that time brings, and vote for the curtailment of our privileges.</quote> ("The Reform of the Royal Academy")

1892, 26 January, Tuesday, the "beloved wife" of a James Archer is listed as having died in the Morning Post ("Deaths [1892]").

1894, 27 October, Saturday, a James Archer is listed among people who submitted a photograph to The Graphic for a Supplement reproducing photographs taken by amateur photographers. The reproductions and paper for the Supplement will be similar to those used for the Supplement issued by The Graphic of reproductions from the exhibition at the Royal Academy each spring. ("To Amateur Photographers." The Graphic Saturday, 27 October 1894: 5. [Behind paywall: http://www.britishnewspaperarchive.co.uk/viewer/bl/0000057/18941027/004/0005])

1896, Archer retired from the Royal Scottish Academy ("The Late James Archer, R.S.A.").

Works edit

Questions and Notes edit

  1. For the portrait of the Royal family: http://www.royalcollection.org.uk/collection/605802/the-royal-family-1880 And here's the Wikimedia image: http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Royal_Family_In_1880.jpg

Unrelated James Archers? edit

  • Various James Archers were convicted of crimes in the 1850s through the 1880s.
  • In 1858, a James Archer was involved in a case in which arsenic was introduced into the ingredients of lozenges and sold in Bradford, making 150 people ill and killing 15.
  • A James Archer, woolen draper and clothier, was active and bankrupt in the 1860s in London.
  • A Rev. James Archer Spurgeon was active in the 1870s.
  • An actor James Archer was performing in the 1880s and 1890s in London.
  • A James Archer was a baker in London in the 1880s.

Bibliography edit

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