xt7qjq0stw34_5422 https://exploreuk.uky.edu/dips/xt7qjq0stw34/data/mets.xml https://exploreuk.uky.edu/dips/xt7qjq0stw34/data/1997ms474.dao.xml unknown archival material 1997ms474 English University of Kentucky The physical rights to the materials in this collection are held by the University of Kentucky Special Collections Research Center.  Contact the Special Collections Research Center for information regarding rights and use of this collection. W. Hugh Peal manuscript collection James Clarke Hook letter to my dear aunt, with clipping text 43.94 Cubic Feet 86 boxes, 4 oversize boxes, 22 items Poor-Good Peal accession no. 11453. James Clarke Hook letter to my dear aunt, with clipping 2017 https://exploreuk.uky.edu/dips/xt7qjq0stw34/data/1997ms474/Box_63/Folder_6/Multipage28656.pdf [1853 March 9], undated 1853 [1853 March 9], undated section false xt7qjq0stw34_5422 xt7qjq0stw34 Z" .2 \r V j
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 HOOK (JAMES CLARKE), ILA.
B. 1819. D. 1907.

James Clarke Hook was born on November 21, 1819, at 27,
Northampton Square, Clerkenwell. His family, said to be of
mixed Norman and Finnish extraction, originally settled near
Wooler, in Northumberland. His father, J udge-Arbitrator Hook,
was a merchant in the West African trade. Obliged to live at
times in Sierra Leone, he sent his son to a proprietary school in
Islington. At fourteen young Hook left with a prize for drawing,
and was taken for advice to Constable and afterwards to John
Jackson. He drew in the British Museum, was admitted to the
Academy Schools, and worked there for three years. He won
medals from the Society of Arts, and his first picture, “The
Hard Task ” (R.A. 1839), gained him commissions for portraits in
Dublin. He contributed unsuccessfully to the Westminster Hall
competition, but won the gold medal and travelling studentship at
the Academy, and went to Italy for three years, with the wife he
had married on getting the news of his success. From Florence he
sent “ Bassanio commenting on the Caskets," to the Academymf
1847, and “Otho IV. at Florence " in the following year. He
went on to Venice, but was forced to come home by the Revolu-
tion of 1848. He settled at Brompton, won his associateship
(1850), by other Italian pictures, and built a house on Campden
Hill (Tor Villa, afterwards Mr. Holman Hunt’s and Mr. Alfred
Hunt’s) ; then went to Abinger in Surrey, and began his real work
by the harvest-field picture called “ A Few Minutes to Wait before
Twelve o’clock” (1853). In 1854 Ulovelly was discovered, and
from that time begins the series of pictures on the western coasts
with which Mr. Hook’s name is associated. “Luif, Boy!" in
1859, was the picture that made him famous. In 1860 he was
elected R.A. Shortly afterwards he settled at Churt, near
Farnham, and built himself the house called Silverbeck. This
remained his home to the end, and it was here he died on April.
16th, 1907 ; but painting excursions carried him to Cornwall, the
Scilly Isles, to Holland and Norway. His appearance in late
years, that of a weather-beaten salt, is well rendered by Millais,
portrait. His portrait by himself, painted by invitation for the
Uflizi collection, was exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1891.