Rutter Force and Drybeck Mill on Hoff Beck, Appleby-in-Westmorland
Rutter Force and Drybeck Mill on Hoff Beck, Appleby-in-Westmorland
1041
De Wint first visited the Lake District in 1824 and exhibited many watercolours of the area in subsequent years at the Society of Painters in Water-Colours. The sketches he made on the spot, such as this one from a roll sketchbook of blue paper, will have served as references for many of these works. Several of these sketches survive.
Rutter Force is a waterfall on Hoff Beck in the Eden Valley, near Appleby-in-Westmoreland. De Wint made and exhibited several watercolours of scenes in the valley. Drybeck Mill was a corn mill dating back at least to the sixteenth century. Long since decommissioned, the mill race has now been placed ornamentally next to where the porch we see in De Wint's drawing once was. In the early nineteenth century (probably following the 1832 repeal of the Corn Laws), the mill was converted to a bobbin mill, and later to a sawmill. In the twentieth century, a turbine was installed and it became the only and unreliable source of electricity for the nearby village of Great Asby until the National Grid turned up to help out in 1952.
Despite the changes, the scene remains quite recognisable today. The spouts of water tumbling over Rutter Force change significantly in power and shape depending on the season and weather.
Dimensions:
c.1824
Black and white chalk on blue paper
With the Folio Society Gallery, Horace Bernard Milling (1898-1953) and his widow, Mrs. Mary Spooner, owners of a significant collection of works by De Wint
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, the mill was converted to a bobbin mill, and later to a sawmill. In the twentieth century, a turbine was installed and it became the only and unreliable source of electricity for the nearby village of Great Asby until the National Grid turned up to help out in 1952. Despite the changes, the scene remains quite recognisable today. The spouts of water tumbling over Rutter Force change significantly in power and shape depending on the season and weather. ){kind=link}