Page 64 - Collecting and Displaying China's Summer Palace in the West

From the Summer Palace 1860 49
of Patna in 1855 but was removed from this office and demoted following his suppres -
sion of the Sepoy Revolt in 1857, which was considered too harsh by his superiors. The
demotion became a cause célèbre, aired in Tayler’s autobiography, in pamphlets, in
the national press and in Parliament with calls for his honouring and re-instatement (neither
of which succeeded). His brother was the artist John Frederick Tayler (1802–1889) and
William himself was a talented artist.
41 Tayler, Thirty-Eight Years, vol. 2, 389.
42 Ibid., 389–391.
43 Bushell, Chinese Art, vol. 2, 82 and fig 97.
44 J.H. Dunne, From Calcutta to Pekin; Being Notes Taken from the Journal of an Officer
Between Those Places (London 1861, reprint 2005), 130.
45 “French Spoils From China,” Illustrated London News, April 13, 1861, 334. See also
figure 1.4.
46 Nick Pearce, “From Relic to Relic: A brief History of the Skull of Confucius,” Journal
of the History of Collections Vol. 26, 2 (July 2014): 207–222.
47 Pearce, “From Relic to Relic,” 215–217.
48 Guthrie’s collection was transferred to the South Kensington Museum (later V&A), in
1879. Guthrie was the eldest son of George Dempster Guthrie of Achavarn estate,
Scotscalder, Caithness in Scotland, and was educated at Addiscombe College for East India
Company cadets and then served with the Bengal Engineers from 1828 until he retired in
1857. See: E. Walford, County Families of the United Kingdom, sixth edition (London:
Robert Hardwicke, 1871), 447 and Susan Strong, “Colonel Guthrie’s Collection,” Oriental
Art, vol.XXXIX, 4 (Winter 1993–1994), 4–13.
49 Katrina Hill, “Collecting on Campaign: British Soldiers in China during the Opium Wars,”
Journal of the History of Collections (2012): 1–26 (21).
50 The Times, March 30, 1865, quoted in Hill, “Collecting on Campaign”, 21.
51 Mark Westgarth, “A Biographical Dictionary of Nineteenth Century Antique and
Curiosity Dealers,” Journal of Regional Furniture (2009): 180.
52 For details of Wareham’s life and death, see: www.thebirdtree.co.uk/showmedia.php?&
medialID=378&tngpage=157. Wareham, like Hewett, supplied Chinese and Japanese
objects to E.W. Godwin. See Susan Weber Soros, ed., E.W. Godwin: Aesthetic Movement
Architect and Designer (Yale University Press, New Haven, 1999), 75. Wareham also
supplied the British Museum and Augustus Pitt Rivers (1827–1900): http://web.prm.ox.ac.
uk/rpr/index.php/people/877-w.html.
53 This would be The Bishop Collection. Investigations and Studies in Jade, edited by George
F. Kunz (New York: The De Vinne Press, 1906).
54 Unlike the French, where the army returned with loot specifically for Emperor Napoleon
III, very little was presented to Queen Victoria. Hope Grant noted (no doubt without
irony): “Oct.8th. The looting in the palace (is being carried on) to a frightful extent today.
Many of the things put aside for the Queen had been looted by the French.” Knollys,
Life, 202.

Bibliography
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Routledge, 2004.
Bushell, Stephen W. Chinese Art. 2 volumes, vol.2. London: HMSO, 1906, rev. 1909.
Christie, Manson and Woods. The Valuable Collection of Carvings in Hard Stone of the Late
Arthur Wells. Esq, May 1–3 and 8–9, 1883.
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Christie’s Hong Kong. The Imperial Sale. April 30, 2000.
Danby, Hope. The Garden of Perfect Brightness. London: Williams and Norgate, 1950.
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