Provenance: Lord Walter Montagu Douglas Scott (1834-1895), Ditton Park, Slough; offered (i.e. unsold) Christie’s London, 29 May 1890, lot 93 (as Canaletti) and by descent in the Buccleuch family to Margaret Ida Hawkins (nee Montagu Douglas Scott, daughter of John, 7th Duke of Buccleuch and 8th Duke of Queensberry); sold from The Old Rectory, Grafton Underwood, Knight, Frank & Rutley [auctioneers], circa 1945 when bought by the mother of the present owner.
Walter Montagu Douglas Scott (1834-1895) was the 3rd son of Walter Francis (1806-1884), 5th Duke of Buccleuch and Charlotte Thynne (born at Longleat in 1811). Charlotte, Duchess of Buccleuch was Queen Victoria’s Mistress of the Robes until 1846. Walter Francis, 5th Duke of Buccleuch was a voracious collector of Sevres, French and English furniture, and was a leading proponent of the hybrid ‘Louis XIV’ Anglo-French style of furniture which held sway in the 1820s to the 1840s. It is possible this pair of paintings was bought by the 5th Duke. Little is known about their son Walter. He lived at 3 Grosvenor Crescent and at Ditton Park, Slough, Berkshire where his mother lived after her husband died in 1884. She died in 1895, the same year as her son’s premature death..
