(click image to enlarge)
Following the death of the artist, John Collet, in 1780, Robert Dighton began to supply caricatures to Carington Bowles, the printseller based at St Paul’s Churchyard, and these continued to appear, as mezzotints, until the early 1790s. In 1793, Dighton brought out his first Collection of Portraits of Public Characters. They proved so successful that he focussed increasingly on caricature and, in the following year, moved to 12 Charing Cross Road to open his own shop. After the turn of the century, he moved to 6 Charing Cross Road, and he retained a shop there until at least 1810. It is likely that the present drawing was drawn for reproduction as a print during the period of his career when he was based at Charing Cross. The image of a young man being hauled away from a tearful lover by a press-gang is one that Robert Dighton turned to a number of times during his career. One such image, titled The Banks of the Shannon, was produced as a print by Carington Bowles in 1799.
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