Ian Hanford: The Torquay connection behind the world’s first Christmas card

In this series of features, Ian l Handford (President of Torbay Civic Society) looks at famous individuals who came or lived in Torbay in the 20th century.

Rector the Reverend John Catcott Horsley

Many of you will have seen the first Christmas Card drawn by the Rev John Catcott Horsley although you may not know he spent a year in Torquay in 1858/9 and even invited Lambarde Kingdom Brunel and Mary to stay with him prior to Brunel’s early death. 

Mary was his sister, Mary Elizabeth Horsley, and Lambarde then his brother-in-law and a strong bond formed between the men.

The Rev Horsley was an artist, illustrator and academic painter and he left the world its first “Christmas Card”. 

Born during the early Victorian era he lived through to the 20th century by surviving until age 85.  

During his earliest painting years his first picture was  "Rent Day at Haddon Hall in the Days of Queen Elizabeth" as exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1839. 

This launched him into a long successful career. Meanwhile Lambard was making proposals to create the South Devon Railway to Dartmouth as the already Chief Engineer of the Great Western Railway.

Leading totally different lives the now related men were real friends and soon went off on a walking holiday in Italy during the 1840’s. 

When his Reverence was asked to design the Christmas Card he had it printed using lithography and hand coloured when producing 1,000 cards. 

Sold through Summerley Home Treasury Office at a shilling each (5p) the thousand cards were sold out quickly and they established the first concept of an annual Christmas card for mainly high class Victorians. 

It would take the cost of a national postage stamp being cut in 1870 before ordinary citizens were able to afford and send Christmas Cards by post. 

In 1848 Rev Horsley and Lambarde decided to set off for Paris so that they might witness a real revolution taking place proving yet again that strong family bond. 

Their temperaments were very different as Horsley was said to be exuberant which had first attracted Brunel. Yet beneath the “exuberance” Horsley had a deep solemnity and sense of duty. Brunel on the other hand throughout life suffered from bouts of doubt and unrelenting melancholy. 

Horsley’s paintings were mainly historical until he did more contemporary subjects like "scenes of flirtation set in the countryside" (commented Reynolds) and pictures of "sunshine and pretty women". 

Meanwhile Brunel was thinking about Torquay for his  retirement which perhaps was helped by the time his brother in law was here.

The Brunel’s for a time lived at Watcombe Villa before moving to Portland Villa (later the Maidencombe House Hotel,-since demolished). 

Brunel had invited Horsley and his second wife Rosamund Haden to Orestone House Maidencombe (today Orestone Manor Hotel) for a summer and eventually they stayed a year. 

While at Orestone the two families enjoyed typical Victorian pursuits of croquet on the lawn, outings by day and social discourse, candlelit dinners and party games in the evenings. Rosamund Horsley , having inherited a large fortune, even allowed them to build a new home at Cranbrook in Kent where they currently lived.  Now Lambarde would purchase the land opposite Orestone Lane being the Watcombe Estate where he planned to build his gentlemen’s Mansion or maybe castle atop Watcombe hill. 

Young Horsley had lost his first wife Elvira and two of their children to scarlet fever and he had expected to die himself.

Fortunately, having survived he would now outlive his brother in law and friend by over 44 years. Yet being concerned about the pressures of life on Lambarde, he wrote an emotional letter imploring his friend to reflect upon his current lifestyle “which has been one of almost unparalleled devotion to your profession, to the exclusion, too far to great an extent, to that which was due to your God and even to your family and an utter disregard of your health”.

Sadly, we now believe it was unlikely Brunel ever read the letter, as he departed the world at age 53.

Fortunately for us Horsley did paint Brunel once, capturing him as a man getting things done, dressed in smart clothes in a relaxed posture at his desk, rather than the more  familiar role of standing before those huge launching chains of the Great Eastern ship with mud on his boots.

In that period Lambarde was known to have remarked the days and weeks he spent at Watcombe “had been the happiest hours of his life”.

An amazing life story lost in time but one that can still affect us today through of all things a simple Christmas Card.  

NEXT WEEK - Part two of the Reverend Horsley 

Image courtesy of: Victoria and Albert Museum, London, uploaded by Mark Cartwright via worldhistory.org