Scotland Forever!
Another extremely old drawing from behind the wardrobe, done with colouring in pencils when I was but a lad. It is a copy of a classic painting I greatly admired as a youth by Lady Butler (1846 – 1933). I still try to get the same sense of movement and panic amongst the horses in my paintings today that she got way back then. Unfortunately, I still have some way to go!
Scotland Forever!, painted in 1881, depicts the charge of the Royal Scots Greys at the Battle of Waterloo in 1815. The horses depicted are the heavy grey mounts used by the regiment throughout its history until mechanization. Two hundred men and 224 horses of the Greys were killed or wounded during this charge. The painting takes its name from the battle cry: "Scotland for ever!"
Elizabeth Southerden Thompson was one of the few female painters to achieve fame for historical paintings, especially military battle scenes, at the end of that tradition. Some of her most famous military scenes come from the Napoleonic Wars, but she also covered most major 19th-century wars and painted several works showing the First World War. She married Lieutenant General Sir William Butler, becoming Lady Butler.