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Henry George Tierney Elton was born in Clifton near Bristol (1825). He is seen here as a boy in a painting by Edward Villiers Rippingille (1798-1859). It was painted (1831). Henry would have been about 6 years old. This would have been at the end of the extended Regency Era and on the cusp of the Victorian Era. Henry was eleventh child and youngest son of Sir Charles Abraham Elton 6th Bt (1778-1853) and Sarah Smith (1782-1830). This meant Sarah died while Henry was very young, in fact before the portrait was painted. Heney sits on a rocky edge of some kind of a bank. The barren bank is a rather unorthodox background. He leans on on his left arm, gazing at the viewer. He wears clothings common furing tghed late Regency. Henry has a belted blue tunic. An art historian calls it a smock with a white skirt. The difference would be that a smock protects outergarments worn underneath while the tunic is the outer garment. And he is not wearing a white skirt, but white pantalettes. Smocks were not genarally worn with pantalettes. He also wears three quarter white socks and modern-looking low-cut black shoes. The tunic has a small white ruffled collar and is tied at the neck with a bow. His straw hat lies near his feet on the left. We know a little about Henry. We know he served in the military amd then became a cleric. He was the Vicar at West Hatch, Somerset. He married Georgina Flora (Willis) Elton Walcot near Bath (1856). Their children included: May Flora Elton (?), Charles Henry Elton (1857-1929), Edmund Hallam Elton (1860-1925), and Arthur Tierney Elton (1863-??)
We have been unable to find any biographical information on this English artist. He was active during the late Regency and early Victorian eras and that he at least sometimes painted on wood. We have noted a portrait by him of Reginald Henry Bean with his wife Emma (daughter of J.R. Lucas of the Nailsea Glassworks) and family on the Backwell Hill painted in 1829. Clearly this is a prosperous family of the rising industrial class being created by the Indusrial Revolution. We have no further details about this family. The portrait, however, is a wonderful example of Regency clothing. Note the somber black and greys in Mr. Bean's so characteristic of Victorian men's clothing are beginning to appear already in Mr. Bean's outfit in contast to his wife's coloful dress. The boys appear to be wearing quite different outfits, but there are definite similarities. Notice the lace collaes and similar styling of the top of the boys outfit with vertical button styling. There certainly are differences. One boy wears a wide-brimmed hat with a high flat crown. The lace collars are tyled differently. The older boys wear long pants. The younger boys wears a tunic a huge number of buttons. Notice only one of buttons continues below the waist. With the tunic the boy wears what look more like pantalettes than pants/trouusers. The girls wear a long dress with long neckline and baloon sleeves. Notice how colorful the boys' clothing is. Both boys have short hair cuts. The gir has longer hair with some curls.
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