Gillray, James. “A Proof of the Refin’d Feelings of an Amiable Character”. Original antique engraving by James Gillray. From the Bohn edition of 1851, using Gillray’s original copper plates. With later hand colouring.

“A proof of the refin’d feelings of an amiable character, lately a candidate for a certain ancient city”was first published in June 1796.

The print is a scathing, sarcastic attack on a sore loser following the British general election of 1796. It depicts an elite political candidate violently assaulting a female campaigner who had been canvassing votes for his opposition.

The “ancient city” referenced in the title is widely identified by historians as York (or occasionally Oxford). During the high-stakes 1796 election, political candidates deployed groups of “lady canvassers”—aristocratic or well-to-do women who used their social clout to sway voters.

When a prominent, wealthy candidate lost the election, his heavily publicised, ungentlemanly meltdown became the talk of the town. Gillray capitalized on this immediately, mocking the candidate’s public reputation as an “amiable character” with “refined feelings” by contrasting it with raw, physical brutality.

True to Gillray’s style, the comedy relies heavily on violent juxtaposition and the subversion of high-class manners:

The central figure is a furious, pot-bellied male candidate who has seized a horrified lady canvasser by her ear. He is aggressively raising a horsewhip, preparing to lash her right in the middle of a public street.

The lady canvasser wears an elegant bonnet and dress, looking utterly shocked and terrified as she is punished simply for doing her political job.

Labeling this act of public domestic violence as a “proof of refined feelings” is Gillray at his most biting and ironic. It systematically tears down the Georgian concept of a “man of feeling” or a “polished gentleman.”

A chaotic, cheering, and horrified crowd watches the public spectacle unfold against a backdrop of historic city spires and towers, further humiliating the upper-class attacker.

Gillray was one of five children, and the only one to survive to maturity. In 1770 he was apprenticed to Harry Ashby, a London writing in engraver, and five years later W. Humphrey published a few of Gillray’s illustrations including satirical works. By the time Gillray commenced his career satire was old, but personal caricature was in its infancy. Other exponents in this form of art were soon overshadowed by Gillray’s superior craftsmanship.

His figures were full of vitality, titillating and reflective of some political crisis or private scandal. As his popularity increased so did demand by the public to see more of his work. In the rapidly changing politics of the late18th century he would produce a plate in twenty-four hours. Although sometimes overlooked his speech bubbles were elaborate and Gillray would spend considerable time composing and redrafting the text.

Between 1791 to 1807 his career continued successfully in association with William and Hannah Humphrey. There after Gillray’s health began to suffer. He eventually slipped into madness and died shortly before the Battle of Waterloo on June 1st 1815. Hannah, who had a close relationship with him nursed Gillray through out his final years and following his death the copper plates then formed part of Hannah’s estate when she died in 1818.

The executors of Hannah’s estate sold Gillray’s painstakingly worked plates for there second hand copper weight. Hearing of this, the then publisher, Bohn who had previously expressed an interest in buying the plates set about purchasing them from a variety of different sources, eventually acquiring over 500. In 1851 Bohn republished the engravings in a large folio volume, “The Works of James Gillray”.