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Lot Essay
H.C.S. Lowther Castle was originally an East India Company clipper ship. It was named for Lowther Castle on the estate of the Lowther family (near Penrith in Cumbria), which held the earldom of Lonsdale since 1292.
Huggins also portrayed the Lowther Castle alongside six other East India Company ships which worked the trade routes to India and China, in a large scale oil entitled 'East Indiamen in the China Seas' painted around 1820-1830 and currently on loan to the National Maritime Museum, Greenwich. The subject of East Indiamen was a familiar one to Huggins who had worked for the company as a steward and assistant purser on board its clipper Perseverance which sailed for Bombay and China in December 1812, returning in August 1814. This may have been his last voyage as by 1817 he had set up as a marine painter in Leadenhall Street, where he specialised in ship portraiture. He exhibited regularly at the Royal Academy from 1817-1844, and from 1836 was marine painter to William IV, 'The Sailor King.'
Huggins also portrayed the Lowther Castle alongside six other East India Company ships which worked the trade routes to India and China, in a large scale oil entitled 'East Indiamen in the China Seas' painted around 1820-1830 and currently on loan to the National Maritime Museum, Greenwich. The subject of East Indiamen was a familiar one to Huggins who had worked for the company as a steward and assistant purser on board its clipper Perseverance which sailed for Bombay and China in December 1812, returning in August 1814. This may have been his last voyage as by 1817 he had set up as a marine painter in Leadenhall Street, where he specialised in ship portraiture. He exhibited regularly at the Royal Academy from 1817-1844, and from 1836 was marine painter to William IV, 'The Sailor King.'