HOWLETT THE ENGRAVER.
(Vol. i., p. 321.)
In your first Volume, an inquiry is made for information respecting the above person. As I find on referring to the subsequent volumes of "N. & Q." that the Query never received any reply, I beg to forward a cutting from the Obituary of the New Monthly Magazine for June, 1828, referring to Howlett; concerning whom, however, I cannot give any further information.
"MR. BARTHOLOMEW HOWLETT.
"Lately in Newington, Surrey, aged sixty, Mr. Bartholomew Howlett, antiquarian, draughtsman, and engraver. This artist was a pupil of Mr. Heath, and for many years devoted his talents to the embellishment of works on topography and antiquities. His principal publication, and which will carry his name down to posterity with respect as an artist, was A Selection of Views in the County of Lincoln; comprising the Principal Towns and Churches, the Remains of Castles and Religious Houses, and Seats of the Nobility and Gentry; with Topographical and Historical Accounts of each View. This handsome work was completed in 4to. in 1805. The drawings are chiefly by T. Girtin, Nattes, Nash, Corbould, &c., and the engravings are highly creditable to the burin of Mr. Howlett. Mr. Howlett was much employed by the late Mr. Wilkinson on his Londina Illustrata; by Mr. Stevenson in his second edition of Bentham's Ely; by Mr. Frost, in his recent Notices of Hull; and in numerous other topographical works. He executed six plans and views for Major Anderson's Account of the Abbey of St. Denis; and occasionally contributed to the Gentleman's Magazine, and engraved several plates for it. In 1817, Mr. Howlett issued proposals for A Topographical Account of Clapham, in the County of Surrey, illustrated by Engravings. These were to have been executed from drawings by himself, of which he made several, and also formed considerable collections; but we believe he only published one number, consisting of three plates and no letter-press. We hope the manuscripts he has left may form a groundwork for a future topographer. They form part of the large collections for Surrey, in the hands of Mr. Tytam. In 1826, whilst the Royal Hospital and Collegiate Church of St. Katharine, near the Tower, was pulling down, he made a series of drawings on the spot, which it was his intention to have engraved and published. But the greatest effort of his pencil was in the service of his kind patron and friend, John Caley, Esq., F.R.S., F.S.A., keeper of the records in the Augmentation Office. For this gentleman Mr. Howlett made finished drawings from upwards of a thousand original seals of the monastic and religious houses of this kingdom."
B. Hudson.
Congleton, Cheshire.