John Montresor, ca. 1771

  • John Singleton Copley, American, 1738-1815

Oil on canvas

  • Unframed: 30 × 25 inches (76.2 × 63.5 cm)
  • 38 × 33 × 3 1/2 inches (96.5 × 83.8 × 8.9 cm)

Founders Society Purchase, Gibbs-Williams Fund

41.37

On View

  • American, Level 2, West

Department

American Art before 1950

Signed, on the back, in paint: John Montresor b. 1736-1799 pinxt Copley

Inscribed, on the back, in paint: John Montresor b. 1736-1799 pinxt Copley

the sitter, John Montresor (Belmont, Facersham, Kent, England)

his son, Sir H. T. Montresor (Dene Hill, Kent, England)

Lt. Col. H. E. Montresor

his brother, Charles M. Montresor (Stonely Grange, Cambridgeshire, England)

his son, Lt. Col. E. H. Montresor

his daughter, Mrs. Joan Montresor Read

The Montresor Family. Howard Young. 1941, Feragil Galleries (New York, New York, USA) 1941-present, purchase by the Detroit Institute of Arts (Detroit, Michigan, USA)

Jones, Guernsey, ed. Letters and Papers of John Singleton Copley and Harry Pelham, 1739-1776. The Massachusetts Historical Society Collection, vol. 71, 1914, p. 114. Bayley, Frank W. The Life and Works of John Singleton Copley. Boston, 1915, p. 22. Webster, John Clarence. “Life of John Montresor.” Royal Society of Canada Transactions, Third Series 22, 2 (1928). The French in America, 1520-1880. Exh. cat., Detroit Institute of Arts. Detroit, 1951, no. 515. Richardson, Edgar P. Paintings in America: The Story of 450 Years. Exh. cat., Detroit Institute of Arts. Detroit, 1957, p. 73 (fig. 26). Davidson, Ruth. “Paintings in America: Seminar and Exhibition.” Antiques 71 (April 1957): p. 364. American Realists. Exh. cat., Art Gallery of Hamilton. Ontario, 1961, no. 13. Treasures in America. Exh. cat., Virginia Museum of Fine Arts. Richmond, 1961, p. 93. Pontiac Uprising 1763-1963. Exh. cat., Detroit Historical Museum. Detroit, 1963, no. 37. Prown, Jules D. John S. Copley 1774-1815. Cambridge, MA, 1966, p. 22 (ill.). Paul Revere’s Boston. Exh. cat., Museum of Fine Arts. Boston, 1975, p. 137, no. 185 (ill.). Bowler, R. Arthur. Logistics and the Failure of the British Army in America. Princeton, 1975. Shaw, Nancy Rivard, et al. American Paintings in the Detroit Institute of Arts, Volume I. New York, 1991, pp. 59, 61-62 (ill.). Hornsby, Stephen J. and Richard W. Judd, eds. Historical Atlas of Maine. Orono, ME, 2015, pl. 17.

John Singleton Copley, John Montresor, ca. 1771, oil on canvas. Detroit Institute of Arts, Founders Society Purchase, Gibbs-Williams Fund, 41.37.