Constance Maria Stopford née Hammersley Lerici Castle, Gulf of La Spezia, Italy

Continental Landscapes: Constance Maria Stopford née Hammersley (1857–1930)

This picture forms part of a collection of sketches by Constance Maria Stopford née Hammersley (1857–1930), produced during her travels in Europe in the 1880s and 1890s. Constance was the daughter of Hugh Montolieu Hammersley, JP and Henrietta Bouverie. Her father was part of the Hammersley banking family descended from Thomas Hammersley (1747–1812), Constance's great-grandfather, who founded what became Hammersley & Co. Thomas and his wife Ann were painted by Gainsborough. The family also included Hugh Greenwood Hammersley (1858–1930), whose wife, Mary Frances Grant, was a fashionable London hostess painted by John Singer Sargent in 1892. On her mother's side, Constance's grandfather was Lt-Gen Sir Henry Frederick Bouverie, Governor of Malta, GCB, GCMG.

In 1882, aged twenty-five, Constance married Lt-Col Henry Edward Stopford (1842–1895) at Lymington. Stopford came from a prominent naval family. The majority of the watercolours in this collection date from Constance's travels in the 1880s and 1890s after her marriage, wintering on the French Riviera, and travelling through Switzerland, Germany and Austria, often painting from the era's grand Victorian hotels. She uses a warm, colourful palette and sketchy, dabbed brushstrokes that suggest the influence of the Impressionists.

Constance outlived her husband by some thirty-five years and died at Ridgeway, Lymington in 1930.