Original Painting C1943 the Badsworth Hunt on Foot, Easingwold: A Wartime Yorkshire Sporting Scene Framed by George Anderson Short

Details

Description

Original 1943 George Anderson Short Watercolor Painting – The Badsworth Hunt on Foot, Easingwold: A Wartime Yorkshire Sporting Scene
A … Read more Original 1943 George Anderson Short Watercolor Painting – The Badsworth Hunt on Foot, Easingwold: A Wartime Yorkshire Sporting Scene
A Portrait of Rural Endurance in Wartime England

In December 1943, as England endured the constraints of war, the quiet town of Easingwold in North Yorkshire gathered for a tradition older than many of its participants: the Boxing Day Hunt. Horses were scarce and fuel rationing strict, yet the hounds of the Badsworth Hunt still took to the frosted fields — this time, on foot. Among those who witnessed the event was George Anderson Short (1856–1945), the distinguished Yorkshire watercolourist whose brush preserved not only the scene but the spirit of a nation holding fast to its heritage.
Short’s The Badsworth Hunt on Foot, Easingwold is more than a sporting painting; it is a document of cultural resilience. Created when the artist was nearly ninety years old, it demonstrates the clarity and restraint of a mature painter working at the height of his understanding. The watercolour captures a crisp winter’s morning: hounds poised, figures gathered in quiet readiness, the hedgerows silvered by frost. In Short’s delicate washes of ochre, grey, and blue, the viewer senses the austerity of wartime England — and the enduring calm of its countryside.

An Artist at the End of an Era
George Anderson Short was born in Yorkshire in 1856 and devoted his career to depicting the life, labour, and landscapes of rural England. His works bridge two centuries of British art, from the pastoral optimism of the Victorian era to the sober realism of the 1940s.
By the time he painted The Badsworth Hunt on Foot, Short had become one of the last exponents of a fading tradition — the regional watercolourist whose art blended topographical accuracy with human empathy. His late works, including this one, are marked by a quiet reverence: the measured spacing of figures, the patient rendering of atmosphere, and an almost elegiac sense of continuity.

The Badsworth Hunt: A Yorkshire Legacy
Founded in 1730, the Badsworth Hunt ranks among Yorkshire’s oldest and most storied foxhound packs. During the Second World War, with horses and fuel diverted to the war effort, mounted meets became impossible. Instead, the huntsmen and followers took to the fields on foot, maintaining the ritual that bound their community together.
Major Vernon Hugh Gamester, C.B.E., then in his eighth season as Master, and Joint Master Charles Lyon led the 1943 Boxing Day meet at Easingwold. Their hounds, drawn from the famous Thorpe Audlin kennels, continued a lineage of English foxhounds prized for purity and discipline.
In capturing this specific moment, Short recorded not simply a sporting event but a symbol of morale — a scene where companionship and tradition prevailed amid uncertainty.

Composition and Technique
The 1943 watercolour is a study in balance and restraint. Short places his figures and hounds with deliberate spacing, allowing the open air of the Yorkshire countryside to breathe through the composition.
His control of tone — from the pale blue of a cold sky to the earthy hues of winter fields — demonstrates his technical assurance. The result is a painting that feels at once documentary and poetic: a testament to the clarity achievable through watercolour in skilled hands.
There is no dramatization, no flourish of sentiment. Instead, Short presents the simple dignity of people continuing to live as they always had, their traditions intact.

Provenance and Presentation
This watercolour comes from a distinguished Yorkshire private collection and was later sold at the Lincoln Fine Art Sale (Golding Young Est. 1864) in 2023.
Verso is titled “The Badsworth Hunt on Foot”, and exhibition records confirm its inclusion as Catalogue No. 47 in “Fields in Waiting: Rural Traditions During Wartime” at the Famous Lord Hill Museum, Autumn 2025.
It has been reframed to museum conservation standards in a Larson Juhl gold leaf frame with UV-protective, low-reflective glass — ensuring both elegance and long-term preservation.

A Work of Art and History
To modern audiences, The Badsworth Hunt on Foot, Easingwold offers more than visual beauty. It is a chronicle of endurance — of a community’s steadfastness, an artist’s lifelong devotion, and a nation’s quiet defiance during war.
For collectors of English sporting art or historians of the rural wartime experience, it represents a rare and eloquent survival from one of the most turbulent decades in British history.
Artist: George Anderson Short (1856–1945)
Title: The Badsworth Hunt on Foot, Easingwold
Date: 1943
Medium: Watercolour on paper
Dimensions (framed): 58.5 × 48.5 × 3.5 cm See less