Plains of Vittoria

Plains of Vittoria 

Henry Wilkinson, 1838 

Hand-coloured lithograph 

The full title of Henry Wilkinson’s book (Sketches of Scenery in the Basque Provinces of Spain, with a Selection of Music, arranged for Piano-Forte and Guitar: Illustrated by Notes and Reminiscences connected with The War in Biscay and Castille) gives an idea of what the reader can expect: a miscellany that encapsulates the author’s wide-ranging interests in northern Spain, its history and culture, and a welcome change from the sun-drenched clichés of southern Spain that were predominant in the late 1830s. 

This hand-coloured lithograph titled ‘Plains of Vittoria’ and signed by Wilkinson shows an imagined scene of British troops surveying the terrain and taking local advice, presumably some time before the battle that took place on 21 June 1813. Wilkinson focuses on the calm before the storm, in contrast to Jenkins’s much more heroic image (1.7), but is no less eloquent for that. The fact that Wilkinson did not publish his lithograph until 25 years after the battle shows just how deeply embedded the war against Napoleon became in the British psyche. George Vivian’s take on Vitoria (2.6), published in the same year, reinforces this sense that the sacrifices of that campaign lingered long in the collective memory. 

Wilkinson is described on the title page as a member of the Royal College of Surgeons and late Staff-Surgeon in the British Legion, but little else is known about him and this volume appears to have been his only publication. The other plates in the volume show a range of locations in the Basque Country, including Fuenterrabía-Hondarribia, Irún-Irun and San Sebastián-Donostia. 

Title: Plains of Vittoria. 

Author/Artist: Henry Wilkinson (artist). 

Technique and Material: Hand-coloured lithograph. 

Dimensions: 180 x 280 mm. 

Published: Plate 2 from Henry Wilkinson, Sketches of Scenery in the Basque Provinces of Spain, with a Selection of Music, arranged for Piano-Forte and Guitar: Illustrated by Notes and Reminiscences connected with The War in Biscay and Castille. London: Ackerman, 1838. 

Date: 1838. 

Marks and Inscriptions: lower edge, left: ‘H. Wilkinson Esq[uire] del[ineavit]’; centre: title as above. 

Institution: Barry Ife Collection.