s The Standidge Whaling Fleet (Berry, Britannia and British Queen) in the Arctic - Hull Museums Collections

The Standidge Whaling Fleet (Berry, Britannia and British Queen) in the Arctic

This highly descriptive painting of the whaling fleet of Sir Samuel Standidge is actually a copy, with little alteration other than it is reversed, from the engraving made by Boydell (1719-1804), after the painting by Charles Brooking (1723-59) of the Greenland Whale Fishery. The latter now hangs at the National Maritime Museum in Greenwich. It was painted long after these ships had ceased sailing as a companion to another canvas showing the fleet, of 1788, to grace the walls of the Standidge home and counting house in High Street. Standidge sent the ‘Berry’ from Hull in 1766 to fish for whales. She returned with only one whale but also brought 300 seal-skins. The skins provided him with the capital needed to make him a successful whale-ship owner.