Katharine Esdaile papers, 1845-1961, bulk 1900-1950

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Summary

Abstract:
This collection contains the papers of English art historian Katharine Ada Esdaile (1881-1950). Much of the collection relates to her research of British monumental sculpture. Notably the collection includes more than 600 chiefly pre-World War II visitor booklets and pamphlets produced locally by British churches and approximately 3500 photographs taken or collected by Esdaile of sculpture, often funerary monuments in English churches.
Extent:
45 Linear Feet (101 boxes)
Language:
English.
Preferred citation:

[Identification of item]. Katharine Esdaile papers, The Huntington Library, San Marino, California.

Background

Scope and content:

This collection contains the papers of English art historian Katharine Ada Esdaile (1881-1950), with the bulk of the materials relating to her research and writings on British monumental sculpture, sculptors, and church monuments from the medieval period to 19th century. Material types include personal writings, diaries, correspondence, business papers, family papers and photographs, research files and research notebooks, and miscellaneous published and unpublished materials. Notably the collection includes more than 600 chiefly pre-World War II visitor booklets and pamphlets produced locally by British churches and approximately 3500 photographs taken or collected by Esdaile of sculpture, often funerary monuments in English churches.

This collection provides a resource for viewpoints on monumental sculpture in the early 20th century (for instance as represented in book reviews by Esdaile) and for information about Esdaile's experience as a woman art historian in the early 20th century. Given the broadness of Esdaile's scope, from medieval to 19th century British monumental sculpture, the collection is less useful for specific information about monuments or sculptors. In addition, many of Esdaile's attributions in her notes appear to have been based primarily on her own instincts and do not have citations. Many of Esdaile's notes are handwritten on small scraps of paper or are fragments, sometimes making the information difficult to parse.

The collection is chiefly Esdaile's files, but the dates on some items (such as post-1950 booklets) indicate the collection was added to and used after her death, presumably by Edmund Esdaile, who also made notes on items in the collection and appears to have done the preliminary organization of the papers after Esdaile's death.

Personal and Professional Papers

Boxes 1-3 contain Esdaile's personal and professional papers and include autobiographical writings, business documents related to Esdaile's publications, miscellaneous family photographs and ephemera, and reports, clippings documents reflecting Esdaile's preservation activities, chiefly during World War II.

Family papers

Boxes 4-7 contain family papers and consist chiefly of writings and correspondence by Esdaile's son Edmund Esdaile, including his own works on art and sculpture. In addition there are some papers of Esdaile's husband Arundell Esdaile and their son Martin Esdaile, and published essays by William Esdaile, presumably Arundell's father.

Correspondence

Boxes 8-15 contain over 3,000 pieces of correspondence chiefly to Katharine Esdaile from fellow enthusiasts of English sculpture, friends and family, publishers, and scholars, including 275 letters from historian Rupert Gunnis. While much of the correspondence to Esdaile concerns her research, the letters also offer information about her social and family life, World War II, and the arts and her work. There are only about 50 outgoing letters from Esdaile.

Writings

Boxes 16-29, 85, and 92-101 contain Esdaile's published and unpublished writing, chiefly about sculpture. Boxes 25-29 contain published versions of Esdaile's writing chiefly comprised of clippings and, to a lesser extent, full issues of periodicals (such as The Architect, Burlington Magazine and Country Life) containing her articles.

Notebooks of Katharine and Edmund Esdaile

Boxes 31-45 contain research notebooks kept by Katharine and Edmund Esdaile chiefly to make notes on British sculptures they viewed on trips throughout England. The notebooks often contain pencil drawings and brief notes or transcriptions, and they vary in their degree of legibility.

Research material: printed booklets

Boxes 46-68 contain more than 600 booklets, brochures, and pamphlets chiefly consisting of church visitor guides, travel brochures, and local histories provided to tourists.

Research material: photographs, slides, illustrations, etc.

Boxes 69-84 contain black-and-white photographs of sculptures and churches taken or collected by Esdaile, as well as some lantern slides and two casts of Epiphanius Evesham's signature. The photographs chiefly depict sculpture in British churches, ranging from large churches like Westminster Abbey to small rural parishes. The photographs are arranged in two separate series: by sculptor or by location, though there is overlap between the two series. While many locations are depicted, there are usually only a few images per location.

Research material: miscellaneous printed publications and manuscript documents

Finally, boxes 85-91 contain miscellaneous printed publications and manuscript documents (not by Esdaile) collected as research material.

Biographical / historical:

British art historian Katharine Ada Esdaile (nÊe McDowall) was born in Sussex, England, on April 23, 1881, to Andrew McDowall and Ada Benson.

Esdaile attended Oxford University and was a scholar at Lady Margaret Hall, reading in Classical Archaeology. In 1903, she began working and studying in the British Museum, researching ancient Greece and Rome; in 1904, her first article, "The So-Called Sardanapolus" (Greek statuary), was published in the Journal of Hellenic Studies. In 1911, Esdaile visited Italy. A year later, her work Walpole and Chatham (1714-1760) was published by G. Bell & Sons.

While Esdaile's initial research focused on ancient Greek and Roman art, in the 1920s, she turned her attention chiefly to English sculpture and sculptors. As a writer, much of Esdaile's works focused on sculpture, but she also tackled subjects as diverse as art criticism and political commentary, producing editorials, articles, and a flow of correspondence with The Times.

During World War II, she was a voice drawing public attention to the need to safeguard the treasures stored in churches being bombed around the country. She became the only woman on a committee of eight (including Sir Kenneth Clark), charged with implementing plans to preserve stained glass, statuary, and church treasures during air raids.

Esdaile published approximately ten books between 1912 and 1946, including works on the sculptor Louis Francois Roubiliac, English church monuments, and St. Martin-in-the-Fields, as well as some 300 published articles. One of her largest projects was never published: the Sculptors' Dictionary, a source-book of artists from many countries who worked in the United Kingdom from the 11th to the late 19th century. Esdaile was a prodigious writer and researcher, although some of her conclusions have proven inaccurate in the face of later scholarship. Her entry in the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography notes, "Although many of her attributions were to be questioned, Esdaile deserves credit for making English post-medieval sculpture seem worthy of attention, and her work was the foundation on which others built."

In 1907, Esdaile married Arundell Esdaile (1880-1956), who worked at the British Museum from 1903 until 1940, serving as secretary from 1926 onward. The Esdailes had three children: James Edmund Kennedy Esdaile (1910-1994), Emmeline Eleanor Esdaile (1913-1994), known as Eleanor Esdaile and later Eleanor Wood, and Martin Kennedy Esdaile (1919-1987). James Edmund Kennedy Esdaile, known as Edmund Esdaile, collaborated with his mother and continued to research English sculpture after her death.

Katharine A. Esdaile died on August 31, 1950.

Source consulted: Malcolm Baker, 'Esdaile, Katharine Ada (1881–1950)', Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, 2004 [http://www.oxforddnb.com.huntington.idm.oclc.org/view/article/33026, accessed 2 Sept 2016]

Acquisition information:
Purchased by the Huntington Library in 1962.
Processing information:

The collection was initially accessioned into the Huntington Art Reference Library in 1962. Sometime afterwards, the printed books and pamphlets were removed, separately catalogued, and shelved with the main body of the Art Reference Books, and the photographs were removed to the Photo Study Collection. In 2005, the Art Reference Library collection was merged into the main collection of the Huntington Library and the decision was made to re-integrate the printed material and photographs of the Esdaile collection into the papers. In May 2005, John Houlton, with the assistance of Marilyn Olsen, compiled a preliminary finding aid and inventory of the collection, which was revised in October 2006, by Catherine Wehrey in March 2013, and Diann Benti in 2016.

Arrangement:

Arranged in the following series:

  1. Personal and Professional Papers (Boxes 1-3)
  2. Family papers (Boxes 4-7)
  3. Correspondence (Boxes 8-15)
  4. Writings (Boxes 16-29, 85, 92-101)
  5. Notebooks of Katharine and Edmund Esdaile (Boxes 31-45)
  6. Research material: printed booklets (Boxes 46-68)
  7. Research material: photographs, slides, illustrations, etc. (Boxes 69-84)
  8. Research material: miscellaneous printed publications and manuscript documents (not by Esdaile) (Boxes 86-91)
Rules or conventions:
Describing Archives: A Content Standard

Access and use

Restrictions:

Open for use by qualified researchers and by appointment. Please contact Reader Services at the Huntington Library for more information.

Terms of access:

The Huntington Library does not require that researchers request permission to quote from or publish images of this material, nor does it charge fees for such activities. The responsibility for identifying the copyright holder, if there is one, and obtaining necessary permissions rests with the researcher.

Preferred citation:

[Identification of item]. Katharine Esdaile papers, The Huntington Library, San Marino, California.

Location of this collection:
1151 Oxford Road
San Marino, CA 91108, US
Contact:
(626) 405-2191
reference@huntington.org
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