A COLLECTION OF WATERCOLOURS RELATING TO SMITH FAMILY ESTATES | A rickety coastal bridge

comprising English School, Two Views of Blendon Hall, Kent, watercolours (each approx. 26 by 37cm.); Hugh Verrell, Lower Ashfold Sussex, 1940, watercolour (25.5 by 37cm.); English School, St John The Baptist Church, Shottesbrooke Park, watercolour (29 by 20cm.); Mrs Sharp, Blendon Cottage, Kent, circa 1860, watercolour (22 by 26cm.) English School, View of the Library at [Hinton House] Hinton St George, watercolour (23 by 30cm.) (6 works framed and glazed)

Blendon Hall in Kent was aquired by Oswald Smith (1794-1863) in 1840. His uncle, the MP John Smith (1767-1842) had lived their previously, so he may well have been familiar with the house and estate as a child. Oswald set about improving the estate dramatically, as well as a building programme. He also laid out a peachery, kitchen garden and developed a large conservatory and orchid house. The estate was sold by his son and heir in 1863. Blendon Cottage was also on the estate and the dower house of Oswald's mother-in-law Mary Hodgson (1778-1863). In 1858 she made a deed of gift that on her death her 'household goods, furniture and fixtures' were to be given to her son-in-law for allowing her to live at Blendon Cottage without 'payment of rent or other pencuniary return'. For further discussion on the estate see Roger Mayo, Blendon from the Earliest Times, Bexley, 2002, pp. 83-92.