Lot 137: Lieutenant Edward Bampfylde Eagles d. 1866 , An album of Sketches 124 sheets in total, watercolour over pencil (88), some with scratching out, bodycolour and gum arabic, pen and brown ink over pencil (36)

including; views of Nancy, ice bergs, the signal for sailing, a yacht close to the wind on the starboard tack, fishing boats, a steamer making a passage, going into St. John's Newfoundland (2), Greenwich Hospital, Hove short ready for casting (2), Dutch Galliot moderate breeze, waiting for the ship's boat, Konigswinter on the Rhine, fresh breezes and squally (2), Clifton and Hotwell's coming up the Severn, gale of wind and heavy sea, a summer's evening, signal for sailing, hauling in the net, Edystone light house off Plymouth (2), view in Norway, Gibraltar, lugger running free, carrying sail in chase, yacht on the starboard tack, Oberwesel on the Rhine, men of war off Cherbourg, the Rhine, Coblenz, Fisherman on the Devon coast (2), Bieberich on the Rhine, a Newfoundland dog saving a child, Rudesheim on the Rhine, Off Ostend (2), Neuwied on the Rhine, off North Yarmouth, coming to an anchor, Wellmich on the Rhine, dismasted and run on the beach, Boppard on the Rhine, Mt. Etna, Pendennis Castle entrance to Falmouth, the coast of Devon (3), the Kentish Coast, scudding in a gale, Dutch Galliott on the lands near Calais, Portsmouth (2), off the coast at Bermuda, at anchor off North Yarmouth, entrance to Boulogne, Mount Edgecombe near Plymouth, Ship on fire and others; bound in an album the majority signed and inscribed, four dated between 1858 and 1859 124 sheets in total, watercolour over pencil (88), some with scratching out, bodycolour and gum arabic, pen and brown ink over pencil (36) Quantity: 124

album 5 by 23.2 cm.; 6 by 9 1/8 in.

VARIOUS PROPERTIES
It is not known when Edward Bampfylde Eagles first enrolled in the Royal Navy but in 1805 he is first recorded in the West Indies. Eagles was soon promoted to Lientenant in the Royal Marine Artillery by 1807. In the album there are several depictions of H.M.S. Agamemnon and towns in Newfoundland and Nova Scotia. This strongly suggests that Eagles was on board the Agamemnon when it laid the first trans-Atlantic submarine cable in July 1858. However, the inclusion in the album of many other views (not only of the British coast but of Continental Europe) suggest that the album was compiled over a number of years. Eagles was evidently a keen amateur artist as there are two other sketchbooks, of a similar size by him at the National Maritime Museum (PAF 2647). The importance of these works as evidence of a bygone martime era should not be underestimated.