We are delighted to update this post with a wonderful addition to the Bent Archive gallery – at last, the lost oil! And by way of tribute to a real artist – ‘Miss J. D. S. Aldworth’ !
For those interested in the background to this painting, read on!
(Or, more accurately really, the knowledge that there is a portrait of Theodore that has been lost, has been discovered.)
Here at the Bent Archive, snippets of biographical information about Theodore and Mabel turn up all the time. On one of our regular trawls through the Irish newspapers, the following few lines from the Dublin Daily Express (1 August 1898) came to light after lying on the sea floor for some 120 years:
‘Miss J. D. S. Aldworth, an Irish artist who is rising to distinction in London, has had the honour of submitting to her Highness the Duchess of York the pastel painting which she presented to be sold for the benefit of the Princess Mary Village Houses. Miss Aldworth studied first in London, and subsequently in Paris, under M. R. L. Fleury… and has exhibited in the Royal Academy, the Institute of Painters, the Royal Hibernian Academy, and other shows. Miss Aldworth. who belongs to a well-known Cork family, is a successful portrait painter in oils and pastels, and adds another name to the long roll of talented Irish artists. Amongst the best portraits in oils we may mention that of the late Theodore Bent, F.R.G.S., F.S.A.’
Now, to us, this is of more interest than the Antikythera Mechanism (retrieved from the deep but a few sea miles from where Theodore dug on Antiparos in 1883/4)! For we now know there is a missing portrait of Theodore to be tracked down. Did Theodore own it? Was it left to Mabel’s sisters and nieces on her death in 1929? All this is to be found out and published.
Two sidetracks can be pointed to.
What of the artist? Jane Dorothea Sophia Aldworth was born on 15 April 1861, the daughter of Colonel Robert Aldworth and Olivia Catherine Morton – a distinguished family from Co. Cork. After training in France, Jane returned to London and Dublin (inter alia) to paint and sculpt. A society artist, Jane, of course, found time for Cheltenham, and theCheltenham Chronicle for Tuesday 21 September 1880 notes the Aldworths arriving at 38 Lansdown Crescent: ‘Col. and Mrs. Aldworth, Miss J. D. S Aldworth, Mr. St. Letter B. Aldworth. Mr. J. J O. Aldworth…’ By 1894/5 Jane had a London base at 37 Seymour Street, and featured her work in a catalogue of the 12th exhibition of the Institute of Painters in Oil Colours (it seems her picture of Theodore was not exhibited). In 1898 we have the article reference in the Dublin Daily Express quoted above. In 1905/6 she exhibited a piece (and offered it for sale at £5.5.0) called ‘The Spirit of the Rose’ at the Royal Hibernian Academy Annual Exhibition.
The Cheltenham Looker-On of Saturday 23 February 1907 has a dismissive view of one of Jane’s pictures on show at the Cheltenham and County Fine Art Society:
‘Amongst other painters who have contributed works of more or less merit, which want of space prevents us from criticising at length, are the following :- A. M. Bryant, A. K. Meadows, Sydney Scott, Rose Willis, W. W. Stephens, Col. Penrose Thaekwell, T. Mesham [and] J. D. S. Aldworth.’
Perhaps, in the end, Jane is better remembered for her charity work than her art. The next we hear of her is a letter in the Dorking and Leatherhead Advertiser (Saturday 28 October 1911): [To the Editor.] Sir, In response to my letter last winter asking for gifts of books, toys, dolls, etc., to send to the Church of England Waifs and Strays and Dr. Barnardo’s Homes, many of your readers kindly interested their young friends, and were able to send several hundred toys, thus bringing joy to many young hearts. I hope this winter we may enlist further sympathy and make a still larger collection. Toy cupboards might now be turned out in anticipation of Christmas, last year’s Christmas cards made into scrap books, dolls re-dressed, etc., and so many less fortunate little brothers and sisters would be enabled to have share in our Christmas cheer. I shall be grateful for all contributions of toys, new and old. They should sent in not later than Saturday, December 3rd. — Yours, etc., J. D. S. Aldworth. Claremont, Dorking.
Jane Aldworth died on 8 June 1913 at age 52, unmarried.
But what of this missing oil painting of Theodore Bent? Suffice it to say, it would be wonderful to locate and exhibit it – pride of place in the RGS Gallery, London. There are few likenesses of Theodore, Mabel’s efforts as expedition photographer were, frankly, undistinguished, and very few have survived because of technical difficulties. Sadly, a large number of her glass slides used for Theodore’s lectures were thrown away in the early 1950s, as being too damaged or faded to make further use of – today they could perhaps have been restored.
Jane’s missing portrait has a date referenced above of 1898, with Theodore having died in May the year before. So when did Theodore pose for Jane? Mabel used a fine studio photograph of her husband for the frontispiece of her account of the couple’s Arabian explorations, Southern Arabia, published in 1900. In all likelihood, this photograph of Theodore, and Jane’s portrait, were executed in the mid 1890s, when Theodore was in his early 40s.
As for how he may have looked in Jane Aldworth’s portrait, let’s stretch our imaginations and look at details from the photograph referred to above and a detail of a fine painting of Theodore’s uncle, Sir John Bent (1793–1857), erstwhile brewer and Mayor of Liverpool. The oil painting of Sir John was done in 1855 by Philip Westcott (1815–1878) and hangs today in the Walker Art Gallery, Liverpool. Looking for a resemblance (and bearing in mind an age difference of some 20 years), can we see family similarities in the eyes and brows? If Jane had painted Theodore at 65, not 45, might he have looked like the portrait of Sir John? But the missing picture, when we find it, will look like the studio photograph published by Mabel in her book of 1900.
So, if you see an unattributed oil painting at auction that has the eyes (though younger) of this sitter – buy it! It is this lost painting of Theodore Bent! Or, of course, if you own it now, or have any further information on Jane Aldworth – do let us know. Jane’s likeness of Theodore may be no oil painting, but we would love to see it!
THERE is a letter of Mabel’s (from a collection now in the RGS, London) dated Friday, 24 February 1893, from Aksum in ‘Abyssinia’, which begins ‘My dear People’ and signs off ‘Best love to you all, Your very loving Mabel’. It starts, alarmingly, ‘Don’t be anxious about us…’
Mabel’s letter to her family, 24 Feb 1893, written during the couple’s risky tour to Aksum and Ethiopia that year. Theodore published his adventures as ‘The Sacred City of the Ethiopians’ (1893).
What follows here on our site, a new leaf being added now and then, represents a virtual photo album of the many correspondents of Mabel’s, her closest Anglo-Irish family connections, to whom she wrote many, many hundreds of letters during her nearly twenty years of travelling with Theodore. You might like to meet them!
The prominent mid-19th century Hall-Dare family developed their wealth principally from the second half of the 18th century, primarily in Essex, as a result of the alliances of several influential families – Dare, Hall, Westley, Eaton, King, Grafton, Mildmay, Hopkins (including the notorious John ‘Vulture’ Hopkins) and others (a useful family tree can be found in The Visitation of Essex of 1879). Between them they owned a portfolio of land and grand houses that gradually found its way into the merged family of the Hall-Dares by the early 19th century: Theydon Manor, Fitzwalters, Wyfields, Cranbrook, East Hall, Wennington Hall, Ilford Lodge, and several others. None of these residences remain in any significant manner. Two churches dedicated to St Mary contain memorials to the family: St Mary’s, Theydon Bois, Essex and St Mary’s, Bunclody, Co. Wexford, Ireland. (Theodore and his family are also remembered in St John’s, Baildon and St James’, Sutton, near Macclesfied).
The memorial to Mabel Bent’s great-grandfather, Robert Westley Hall (d. 1834), in St Margaret’s Church, Barking, London ((c) Bob Speel).
The early families’ combined wealth and influence (several members were MPs, Justices, Sheriffs, etc.) derived from agriculture, trade, property, and, it has to be said, plantation ownership, particularly in what is now British Guiana. A key family member was Robert Westley Hall (d. 1836), who, returning from British Guiana, married the heiress Elizabeth Grafton Dare in 1815, and, in 1823, changed his name to Hall-Dare. The couple had eleven children, who went on to be the beneficiaries of the many Essex estates, most of which now (2018) have been dispersed. The main residence was left not to Robert’s eldest boy (Mabel Bent’s father, also Robert (1817-1866), and the eldest was after this always christened Robert Westley) but to his second son, Henry (1825-1908). The eldest boy promptly sold most of his share of the estates and took himself off to Ireland, where he married into an aristocratic family and can be said to have settled. There are many, many descendants from the eleven children of Robert and Elizabeth mentioned previously; perhaps the main seat of the family today might be thought of as being Newtownbarry House, Bunclody, Co. Wexford, although there does no longer seem to be a current Robert Westley Hall-Dare.
For the background to the extended Hall-Dare family (in 1912), see Sir Bernard Burke, A Genealogical and Heraldic History of the Landed Gentry of Ireland(1912, London, pp. 165-6. Mabel is listed as the second daughter of Robert Westley Hall-Dare, marrying Theodore Bent in August 1877.
Most of the photographs to follow (from the Bent Archive Collection) are examples of the new carte de visite format developed by André-Adolphe-Eugène Disdéri (1819–1889). Two of the photographs to come are actually from the Disdéri Studio itself.
The rare albumen print below of Mabel’s mother, Frances Anna Catherine Hall-Dare (née Lambart), is from the studio of the eminent court photographer Camille Silvy (1834-1910). Coming from a French aristocratic background, Silvy established himself as one of the leading portrait photographers in London. He moved to London in 1859 and bought Caldesi and Montecchi’s studio on Porchester Terrace. He kept daybooks with the details of each sitter, the date, and a file print, and these, with five members of the Hall-Dare family, are now in the National Portrait Gallery’s archives, London.
Do visit regularly (sign up to our blog posts if you like!) to see new additions to our album of Mabel’s relatives, and please let us know if you have any faces to add (info@tambent.com).
We do hope you will find the album that follows both interesting and diverting.
Best wishes
The Bent Archive
PS. Many of the photographs on our website are from the Bent Archive Collection; please contact us for reproduction requests (info@tambent.com).
A rare ‘cdv’ of Mabel V(irginia)A(nna)Hall Dare (1847-1929), showing the only known signature in maiden form.
A studio portrait of Mabel taken when she was around 25 or so in Florence (in the 1860s or ’70s). Mabel and her siblings travelled frequently on the continent most long, unhurriedsummers, until their various marriages obliged them otherwise. The portrait (a ‘carte de visite’) of Mabel was shotin the celebrated society studiosof Montabone in Florence, perhaps taken at the same time as the likenesses of hersisters Olivia and Frances below (nos. 9 & 10). Mabel has added her name – Mabel V(irginia)A(nna)Hall Dare, her only traced signature in maiden form. It is a strikingly lovely and reflective portrait: the black Irish lace trim to her dress might, from respect, be for her mother (d. 1862 ) or father (d. 1866); the starry jet (?) earring she wants us to notice, the locket we cannot read; andhertrademark long, red hair plaited and coiled – with a flourish surely meant forthe Ufizzi.
Mabel Virginia Anna Hall-Dare (1847-1929), later Mrs. J. Theodore Bent, aged 19.
SITTER: Mabel Virginia Anna Hall-Dare (1847-1929), later Mrs. J. Theodore Bent. The date is October 1866 and Mabel is just 19, the setting most likely the garden of Newtownbarry House, Co. Wexford, the family home, then as now. From this genteel, Anglo-Irish estate, Mabel was to travel just over a decade later, as Mrs. J. Theodore Bent, to remote and unrecorded corners of the Eastern Mediterranean, Africa, and Arabia, marking her out as one of the most well-known woman travellers of her era. Although Mabel is in mourning black for her father, Robert Westley Hall-Dare, who died in April of that year, the expression on her powerful face, her famous red hair tucked away, is enigmatic. She holds up to the camera what looks like the ace of spades or clubs, as if making some sort of statement to her father. The recently deceased Hall-Dare was anything but an ideal father, dying in the up-scale asylum for distressed gentry that was Ticehurst House Hospital at Ticehurst, East Sussex. DATE: October 1866. STUDIO: Detail from a private family photograph.
Mabel Bent in her wedding gown (1877?).
SITTER: Mabel Virginia Anna Bent (née Hall-Dare) (1847-1929), in her wedding dress. Mabel Virginia Anna Hall-Dare was the daughter of Robert Westley Hall-Dare and Frances Anne Catharine Lambart. She married James Theodore Bent on 2nd August 1877 in Staplestown church, Co. Carlow, Ireland. DATE: Presumably around the time of her marriage, 2 August 1877. STUDIO: T. Fall, 9 Baker Street, Portman Square, London. Fall set up as a portrait photographer in the 1850s in Bedale, Yorkshire. In the late 1860s he moved to London to work for the established studio of Elliott and Fry in Baker Street, and from there founded his own business in 1875, also in Baker Street. He began to specialise in photographing dogs and was commissioned by the Princess of Wales, later Queen Alexandra, to photograph her with her dogs earning the company a Royal Warrant. Fall died In 1900.
Mabel Hall-Dare (later Bent) holding her niece Hilda (1870s?).
SITTER: Mabel Virginia Anna Bent (née Hall-Dare) (1847-1929), later Mrs J T Bent, holding her niece Hilda. Hilda Mary Hall-Dare was the daughter of Mabel’s brother, Robert Westley Hall-Dare and Caroline Susan Henrietta Newton. Hilda married James Erskine Wise Booth, son of George Booth and Georgiana Susanna Arabel Barton, on 30 December 1890. She died on 3 August 1953. Hilda and James had three children: Lt.-Col. Arthur Ronald Booth (1891–1954); Evelyn Mary Booth (b. 1897); Brigadier John Roberts Booth (1901–1971). DATE: Late 1860s (?) STUDIO: M. Allen and Co., 12 Westland Row, Dublin.
Mabel Hall-Dare (later Bent) as a young woman (1860s).
SITTER: Mabel Virginia Anna Hall-Dare (1847-1929), later Mrs. J. Theodore Bent, as a young woman. Very aware of her fine red hair, a lock falls casually over her left shoulder, escaping from an otherwise carefully managed coiffure. The photograph is from the collection of Turtle Bunbury and reproduced with permission (Turtle’s great-aunt, Veronica Hall-Dare, is a distant relative of Mabel’s brother Robert, via his heir, also Robert (see below)). DATE: Late 1860s (?) STUDIO: Unknown.
‘Mrs Bent and her Camera’. Photo by Russell & Sons, London, probably Spring, 1895
SITTER: Mabel Virginia Anna Bent (née Hall-Dare, 1847-1929). An illustration first printed in ‘The Album, A Journal of Photographs of Men, Women and Events of the Day’ (Vol. 2, no.2, 8 July 1895, pp. 44-45). This is an extremely rare studio photo of Mabel standing beside her camera and tripod and attired for the wilds; very few people will have seen this since it was published in July 1895. Assuming the portrait was taken in the first half of that year, Mabel – her trademark long red hair coiled elegantly as ever – would have just reappeared from Muscat, Oman and Dhofar, and be preparing for the coming winter’s journey with her husband along the west coast of the Red Sea. That Mabel would feature in ‘The Album’ is no surprise – ever since the couple’s journey in 1891 to the ruins of Great Zimbabwe for Cecil Rhodes the Bents were celebrities. Mabel was expedition photographer, but it’s not immediately obvious which of her cameras she is displaying here; her small apparatus of choice was a’Luzo’ box camera, however the protruding lens indicates another, larger model. If anyone can identify it, please write in. DATE: Presumably April-June 1895. STUDIO: James Russell and Sons were a firm of portrait photographers with their principal studio at Littlehampton and others at Chichester, Worthing, Bognor and Petworth. They also advertised themselves as landscape photographers and exhibited views at the International Exhibition, London, in 1862. It is almost certain that the portrait was taken in the Baker Street studio (17 Baker Street, Portman Square, London W.), the premises they operated from between 1889-1908. The manager then was John Lemmon Russell.
Robert Westley Hall-Dare (Mabel’s brother).
SITTER: Robert Westley Hall-Dare (1840–1876); Mabel’s brother. Robert was born on 9 June 1840. He was the son of Robert Westley Hall-Dare and Frances Anne Catharine Lambart/Lambert. He was educated at Brighton College, Eton, and Christ Church, Oxford. He married Caroline Susan Henrietta Newton, daughter of Henry Newton and Elizabeth Jane Doyne, on 27 October 1863. He died on 18 March 1876 at age 35 of typhoid in Rome, while on extended holiday and is buried there (tomb no. 2084, ‘Cimitero Acattolico’). The couple had 6 children: Hilda Mary Hall-Dare (1870-1953); Elizabeth Frances Hall-Dare (1865-1956); Evelyn Una Hall-Dare (1872-1961); John Marmaduke Hall-Dare (1865-1866); Robert Westley Hall-Dare (b. 14 Oct 1866 – 20 Feb 1939); Arthur Mildmay Hall-Dare (1867-1941). Robert held the office of Deputy Lieutenant for County Wexford. He held the office of Justice of the Peace for County Carlow; the office of Justice of the Peace for County Wexford; the office of High Sheriff of County Carlow in 1868; the office of High Sheriff of County Wexford in 1872. He lived at Theydon Bois, Essex, England and Newtownbarry House, Bunclody, County Wexford, Ireland. He stood for Parliament twice (1868 and 1874) but was unsuccessful both times. DATE: 1874; two years before his death. STUDIO: Disdéri, 8 Boulevard des Italiens, Paris. Disdéri perfected the photographic visiting card. Robert and his wife Caroline had a base in Paris in the 1870s.
Robert Westley Hall-Dare as a boy (Mabel’s brother).
SITTER: Robert Westley Hall-Dare (1840–1876); Mabel’s brother. Robert was born on 9 June 1840. He was the son of Robert Westley Hall-Dare and Frances Anne Catharine Lambart/Lambert. He was educated at Brighton College, Eton, and Christ Church, Oxford. He married Caroline Susan Henrietta Newton, daughter of Henry Newton and Elizabeth Jane Doyne, on 27 October 1863. He died on 18 March 1876 at age 35 of typhoid in Rome, while on extended holiday. The couple had 6 children: Hilda Mary Hall-Dare (d. 3 Aug 1953); Elizabeth Frances Hall-Dare (d. 6 Feb 1956); Evelyn Una Hall-Dare (1872-1961); John Marmaduke Hall-Dare (b. 23 Sep 1865 – 1866); Robert Westley Hall-Dare (b. 14 Oct 1866 – 20 Feb 1939); Arthur Mildmay Hall-Dare (b. 11 Oct 1867 – 31 May 1941). Robert held the office of Deputy Lieutenant for County Wexford. He held the office of Justice of the Peace for County Carlow; the office of Justice of the Peace for County Wexford; the office of High Sheriff of County Carlow in 1868; the office of High Sheriff of County Wexford in 1872. He lived at Theydon Bois, Essex, England and Newtownbarry House, Bunclody, County Wexford, Ireland. DATE: mid 1850s? STUDIO: Unknown, as is the location, but possibly the Hall-Dare estates in Essex. The image is from a group photograph including sister Ethel and aunt Elizabeth Catherine Hall-Dare. The children are dressed as if ready for a game of battledore.
Caroline Susan Henrietta Hall-Dare, née Newton (Mabel’s sister-in-law).
SITTER: Caroline Susan Henrietta Newton (b. 11 May 1842 – 1918) was the daughter of Henry Newton and Elizabeth Jane Doyne. She was Mabel’s sister-in-law. She married Mabel’s brother, Robert Westley Hall-Dare, son of Robert Westley Hall-Dare and Frances Anne Catharine Lambart, on 27 October 1863. (For their children see No. 4 above.) DATE: 1870s ? STUDIO: Disdéri, 8 Boulevard des Italiens, Paris. Disdéri perfected the photographic visiting card. Robert and his wife Caroline had a base in Paris in the 1870s.
Caroline Susan Henrietta Hall-Dare, née Newton (Mabel’s sister-in-law).
SITTER: Caroline Susan Henrietta Newton (b. 11 May 1842 – 1918) was the daughter of Henry Newton and Elizabeth Jane Doyne. She was Mabel’s sister-in-law. She married Mabel’s brother, Robert Westley Hall-Dare, son of Robert Westley Hall-Dare and Frances Anne Catharine Lambart, on 27 October 1863. (For their children see No. 4 above.) DATE: 1870s (?) STUDIO: Scott & Son, Devonshire Street, Carlisle, UK.
SITTER: Olivia Frances Grafton Hall-Dare (1843-1926) was the daughter of Robert Westley Hall-Dare and Frances Anne Catharine Lambart. She married the Reverend Richard Johnston (died 27 November 1906) in July 1883. They had no children (?). Olivia died in 1926. She was Richard’s second wife. He married, firstly, Augusta Sophia Hamilton in 1844. She was known to the family as Iva. DATE: 1860s or 70s (?). STUDIO:Montabone, via dei Banchi 3, Florence.
Frances Maria Hall-Dare (later Hobson) (Mabel’s sister).
SITTER: Frances Maria Hall-Dare (1852-1924) was the daughter of Robert Westley Hall-Dare and Frances Anne Catharine Lambart. She married Reverend Edward Waller Hobson on 11 June 1891. They had no children. She was known to the family as Faneen. Hobson (1851-1924) is buried at Saint Patrick’s Church of Ireland Cathedral, Armagh and his wife is assumed to rest with him, although The Portadown News for Saturday, 10 January, 1925, writes: “Mrs. Frances Mary Hobson, of 13 Great Cumberland Place, London, W., formerly of the Library, Armagh, who died on November 3rd last [1924], widow of the Venerable Edward Waller Hobson, Archdeacon of Armagh, of Bennekerry House, Carlow, left personal property in England valued at £5,483.” DATE: 1860s or 70s (?) STUDIO:Montabone, via dei Banchi 3, Florence
Frances Maria Hall-Dare (later Hobson) (Mabel’s sister).
SITTER: Frances Maria Hall-Dare (1852-1924) was the daughter of Robert Westley Hall-Dare and Frances Anne Catharine Lambart. She married Reverend Edward Waller Hobson on 11 June 1891. They had no children. She was known to the family as Faneen. Hobson (1851-1924) is buried at Saint Patrick’s Church of Ireland Cathedral, Armagh and his wife is assumed to rest with him, although The Portadown News for Saturday, 10 January, 1925, writes: “Mrs. Frances Mary Hobson, of 13 Great Cumberland Place, London, W., formerly of the Library, Armagh, who died on November 3rd last [1924], widow of the Venerable Edward Waller Hobson, Archdeacon of Armagh, of Bennekerry House, Carlow, left personal property in England valued at £5,483.” DATE: 1860s or 70s (?) STUDIO: C. Hawkins, Brighton School of Photography.
Ethel Constance Mary Hall-Dare (Mabel’s sister).
SITTER: Ethel Constance Mary Hall-Dare (Mabel’s sister) (10 Oct. 1848-1930). Ethel Constance Mary Hall-Dare was the daughter of Robert Westley Hall-Dare and Frances Anne Catharine Lambart. She married Lieutenant Beauchamp Frederick Bagenal, son of Philip Bagenal and Georgiana Thomasina Boyd, on 5 July 1870. She lived at Benekerry, Carlow, County Carlow, Ireland. The couple had 5 children (Mabel’s nephews and nieces): Mary Verena Bagenal (1871-1889); Beauchamp Walter Bagenal (1873-1952); Major Charles James Bagenal (1877-1955); Violet Ethel Bagenal (1882-1962); Kathleen Prudence Eirene Bagenal (1886-1974). The sitter is in mourning for her father Robert Westley Hall-Dare who died earlier that year in 1866. DATE: October 1866. STUDIO: Detail from a family photograph.
Ethel Constance Mary Hall-Dare (Mabel’s sister).
SITTER: Ethel Constance Mary Hall-Dare (Mabel’s sister) (10 Oct. 1848-1930). Ethel Constance Mary Hall-Dare was the daughter of Robert Westley Hall-Dare and Frances Anne Catharine Lambart. She married Lieutenant Beauchamp Frederick Bagenal, son of Philip Bagenal and Georgiana Thomasina Boyd, on 5 July 1870. She lived at Benekerry, Carlow, County Carlow, Ireland. The couple had 5 children (Mabel’s nephews and nieces): Mary Verena Bagenal (1871-1889); Beauchamp Walter Bagenal (1873-1952); Major Charles James Bagenal (1877-1955); Violet Ethel Bagenal (1882-1962); Kathleen Prudence Eirene Bagenal (1886-1974). Mabel bequeathed Ethel the entire contents of her London home in 1929. DATE: 1880s? STUDIO: Detail from a family photograph in the collection of Turtle Bunbury.
Ethel Constance Mary Hall-Dare as a girl (Mabel’s sister).
SITTER: Ethel Constance Mary Hall-Dare (Mabel’s sister) (1848-1930). Ethel Constance Mary Hall-Dare (1848-1930) was the daughter of Robert Westley Hall-Dare and Frances Anne Catharine Lambart. She married Lieutenant Beauchamp Frederick Bagenal, son of Philip Bagenal and Georgiana Thomasina Boyd, on 5 July 1870. She lived at Benekerry, Carlow, County Carlow, Ireland. The couple had 5 children (Mabel’s nephews and nieces): Mary Verena Bagenal (1871-1889); Beauchamp Walter Bagenal (1873-1952); Major Charles James Bagenal (1877-1955); Violet Ethel Bagenal (1882-1962); Kathleen Prudence Eirene Bagenal (1886-1974). DATE: mid 1850s. STUDIO: Unknown, as is the location, but possibly the Hall-Dare estates in Essex. The image is from a group photograph including brother Robert and aunt Elizabeth Catherine Hall-Dare. The children are dressed as if ready for a game of battledore.
Lieutenant Beauchamp Frederick Bagenal. The husband of Mabel’s sister Ethel, thus her brother-in-law.
SITTER: Lieutenant Beauchamp Frederick Bagenal (1846–1930). The husband of Mabel’s sister Ethel, thus her brother-in-law. Lieutenant Beauchamp Frederick Bagenal (1846–1930) was born on 10 September 1846. He was the son of Philip Bagenal and Georgiana Thomasina Boyd. He married Mabel’s sister Ethel Constance Mary Hall-Dare (1848-1930) on 5 July 1870. He died on 7 January 1930 at age 83. He was educated at Cheltenham College, Cheltenham, Gloucestershire, England. He was educated at Royal Military College, Sandhurst, Berkshire, England. He gained the rank of Lieutenant in the 45th Regiment. He fought in the Abyssinian Campaign in 1868. He held the office of High Sheriff in 1872; the office of Deputy Lieutenant; the office of Justice of the Peace. He was a volunteer under Garibaldi. He lived at Benekerry, Carlow, County Carlow, Ireland. The couple had 5 children (Mabel’s nephews and nieces): Mary Verena Bagenal (1871-1889); Beauchamp Walter Bagenal (1873-1952); Major Charles James Bagenal (1877-1955); Violet Ethel Bagenal (1882-1962); Kathleen Prudence Eirene Bagenal (1886-1974). In Paris on 26 August 1871, Mabel was under orders to buy him a present (wedding anniversary?), the deed recorded in her brother Robert’s diary: “The omnibus changing its wheels when leaving the rails at the Place de la Concorde, took us right down to the Palais Royal, where we had a very good dinner at the ‘Cinq Arcades’, after which we walked up to the Passage Jouffroy for Mabel to execute a commission from Ethel to buy something for Beechy. We thought a stick rack made of boars’ tusks most suitable and accordingly bought them…”
Kathleen Prudence Eirene Bagenal (later Blackett, later Swiny) (Mabel’s niece)
SITTER: Kathleen Prudence Eirene Bagenal (1886-1974) (Mabel’s niece) was the third daughter of Ethel Constance Mary Hall-Dare (Mabel’s sister) and Lieutenant Beauchamp Frederick Bagenal, son of Philip Bagenal and Georgiana Thomasina Boyd. She was raised at Benekerry, Carlow, County Carlow, Ireland. She married first William Stewart Burdett Blackett (1873-1914) on 6 April 1907 in Staplestown Church, Carlow, where in 1877 her sister Mabel had wed Theodore Bent; the couple had one son (Christopher William Stewart Burdett Blackett, 1908–1985). They lived in Dumfriesshire, Scotland. In 1918 she married William Frederick Swiny (d. 1950). Her name was legally changed to Kathleen Prudence Eirene Blackett-Swiny after her second marriage, she assumed the combined surnames of her husbands. DATE: c. 1900? STUDIO: Detail from a family photograph in the collection of Turtle Bunbury.
Hilda Mary Hall-Dare (later Booth) (Mabel’s niece).
SITTER: Hilda Mary Hall-Dare (later Booth), born in 1870, she died on 3 August 1953 (Mabel’s niece). Hilda Mary Hall-Dare was the daughter of Robert Westley Hall-Dare and Caroline Susan Henrietta Newton. She married James Erskine Wise Booth, son of George Booth and Georgiana Susanna Arabel Barton, on 30 December 1890. She died on 3 August 1953. Hilda and James had three children: Lt.-Col. Arthur Ronald Booth (b. 6 Oct 1891 – d. 25 Aug 1954); Evelyn Mary Booth (b. 30 Oct 1897); Brigadier John Roberts Booth (b. 5 Jan 1901 – d. 2 Jun 1971). A much-loved niece, Hilda was at Mabel’s bedside when she died at her London home on 3 July 1929, having come over from Ballinapark House, near the Hall-Dare estates in Newtownbarry, Co. Wexford. DATE: Late 1860s(?) STUDIO: Lambert, Artist in Photography, Dublin Street, Carlow, Ireland.
Hilda Mary Hall-Dare (later Booth) (Mabel’s niece).
SITTER: Hilda Mary Hall-Dare (later Booth), born in 1870, she died on 3 August 1953 (Mabel’s niece). Hilda Mary Hall-Dare was the daughter of Robert Westley Hall-Dare and Caroline Susan Henrietta Newton. She married James Erskine Wise Booth, son of George Booth and Georgiana Susanna Arabel Barton, on 30 December 1890. She died on 3 August 1953. Hilda and James had three children: Lt.-Col. Arthur Ronald Booth (b. 6 Oct 1891 – d. 25 Aug 1954); Evelyn Mary Booth (b. 30 Oct 1897); Brigadier John Roberts Booth (b. 5 Jan 1901 – d. 2 Jun 1971). A much-loved niece, Hilda was at Mabel’s bedside when she died at her London home on 3 July 1929, having come over from Ballinapark House, near the Hall-Dare estates in Newtownbarry, Co. Wexford. DATE: Late 1870s(?) STUDIO: W. Clayton Browne, Sandbrook, Co. Carlow, Ireland.
Hilda Mary Hall-Dare (later Booth) (Mabel’s niece).
SITTER: Hilda Mary Hall-Dare (later Booth), born in 1870, she died on 3 August 1953 (Mabel’s niece). Hilda Mary Hall-Dare was the daughter of Robert Westley Hall-Dare and Caroline Susan Henrietta Newton. She married James Erskine Wise Booth, son of George Booth and Georgiana Susanna Arabel Barton, on 30 December 1890. She died on 3 August 1953. Hilda and James had three children: Lt.-Col. Arthur Ronald Booth (b. 6 Oct 1891 – d. 25 Aug 1954); Evelyn Mary Booth (b. 30 Oct 1897); Brigadier John Roberts Booth (b. 5 Jan 1901 – d. 2 Jun 1971). A much-loved niece, Hilda was at Mabel’s bedside when she died at her London home on 3 July 1929, having come over from Ballinapark House, near the Hall-Dare estates in Newtownbarry, Co. Wexford. DATE: 1880s(?) STUDIO: Julius Schaar, Dusseldorf and Trier, Germany.
Olivia Francis Lambart (1818 – 29 July 1893) and Miss Anson. Olivia was Mabel’s much-loved ‘Aunt Loodleloo’. The Ansons were Hall-Dare family friends.
SITTER: Olivia Francis Lambart was the daughter of Gustavus Lambart (Mabel’s grandfather) and Anna Butler Stevenson (Mabel’s maternal grandmother). She died on 29 July 1893, unmarried. Her sister Frances Anne Catharine Lambart married Robert Westley Hall-Dare. In this photograph she is in mourning for her brother-in-law, who died earlier in 1866. DATE: October 1866. STUDIO: Detail from a private family photograph.
Alice Mary Hall-Dare, née Tupper (wife of Mabel’s Uncle Henry, and known as ‘Aunt Alice’).
SITTER: Alice Mary Tupper (3 May 1834 – May 1915) was known as ‘Aunt Alice’ to Mabel Bent and her family. She was the daughter of Daniel Tupper and Anna Maria Le Marchant [pers. comm. Kelly McDonald]. She married Mabel Bent’s uncle Henry Hall-Dare (8 Feb 1825 – Sep 1908) on 24 May 1882. Alice was Henry’s second wife. Henry gained the rank of captain in the 23rd Regiment (Royal Welsh Fusiliers). He was also Under-Treasurer of the Inner Temple. He died in September 1908 at age 83. DATE: Around 1882? STUDIO: Durrant & Son, Torquay.
Alice Mary Hall-Dare, née Tupper (wife of Mabel’s Uncle Henry, and known as ‘Aunt Alice’).
SITTER: Alice Mary Tupper (3 May 1834 – May 1915) was known as ‘Aunt Alice’ to Mabel Bent and her family. She was the daughter of Daniel Tupper and Anna Maria Le Marchant [pers. comm. Kelly McDonald]. She married Mabel Bent’s uncle Henry Hall-Dare (8 Feb 1825 – Sep 1908) on 24 May 1882. Alice was Henry’s second wife. Henry gained the rank of captain in the 23rd Regiment (Royal Welsh Fusiliers). He was also Under-Treasurer of the Inner Temple. He died in September 1908 at age 83. DATE: Later in life. STUDIO: Fratelli Vianelli, Venice.
Arthur Mildmay Hall-Dare (1867–1941). Mabel’s nephew, the son of Mabel’s brother Robert.
SITTER: Arthur Mildmay Hall-Dare was born on 11 October 1867. Mabel’s nephew, he was the son of Mabel’s brother Robert Westley Hall-Dare and Caroline Susan Henrietta Newton. He was educated at Eton College, Windsor, Berkshire, England. He married Edith Clare Fitzherbert, daughter of Henry Gorry Fitzherbert and Mary Emily Vansittart, on 8 July 1897. He lived at Cliff, Rathfarnham, County Dublin, Ireland and Dangan, Thomastown, County Kilkenny, Ireland. The couple had three children: Irene Clare Hall-Dare (b. 4 Aug 1898); Lt.-Col. Derrick Arthur Hall-Dare (b. 4 Dec 1900 – d. Jan 1985); Ena Mildred Hall-Dare (b. 29 Aug 1905). He died on 31 May 1941 at age 73. DATE: mid 1870s (?) STUDIO: M. Allen and Co., 12 Westland Row, Dublin.
Robert Westley Hall-Dare (1866–1939). Mabel’s nephew, the son and heir of Mabel’s brother Robert.
SITTER: Robert Westley Hall-Dare was born on 14 October 1866. He was the son of Robert Westley Hall-Dare and Caroline Susan Henrietta Newton. He married Helen Gordon, daughter of John Taylor Gordon and Margaret Watson, on 6 April 1896. He died on 20 February 1939 at age 72. He was educated at Malvern and Eton College, Windsor, Berkshire, England. He gained the rank of Captain in the 9th Brigade North Irish Division, Royal Artillery. He gained the rank of Captain in the Derry Artillery (Militia). He held the office of High Sheriff of County Wexford in 1891; the office of High Sheriff of County Carlow in 1896; the office of Justice of the Peace for County Wexford; the office of Justice of the Peace for County Carlow; the office of Deputy Lieutenant for County Wexford. He lived at Newtownbarry, County Wexford, Ireland and East Hall, Wennington, Essex, England. DATE: Early 1870s. STUDIO: Francis C. Earl, Malvern and Worcester.
Elizabeth Catherine Hall-Dare (Mabel’s Aunt).
SITTER: Elizabeth Catherine Hall-Dare, Mabel’s aunt, was the daughter of Robert Westley Hall-Dare and Elizabeth Grafton. She married Reverend John Thomas Richardson Fussell, son of Thomas Fussell and Sarah (?), on 29 May 1855 at St. George’s, Hanover Square, London. Their children were Henry Davies Fussell (b. 1857, d. 11 Jun 1889) and Dorothy Evelyn Chetwoode Fussell (b. 17 Apr 1878, d. 13 Sep 1965). Elizabeth died on 11 April 1882. DATE: mid 1850s? STUDIO: Unknown, as is the location, but possibly the Hall-Dare estates in Essex; the image is from a group photograph.
Frances Anna Catherine Hall-Dare (Mabel’s mother)
SITTER: Frances Anna Catherine Hall-Dare (née Lambart) was born c. 1819, the daughter of Gustavus Lambart and Anna Butler Stevenson. She married Robert Westley Hall-Dare, son of Robert Westley Hall-Dare and Elizabeth Grafton, on 18 April 1839, withwhom she had six children. She was born on the Lambart estates of Beauparc, Co. Meath, residing at the Temple House, Sligo, then Newtownbarry House, Co. Wexford, and 49 Eaton Place, London, where she died after a long and painful illness on 2nd September 1862. She is buried in the Hall-Dare plot/vault at St Mary’s Theydon Bois, Essex, on 6 September 1862, aged just 43 (Burial record 422). DATE: 20 November 1861 (ten months before her death). STUDIO: Camille Silvy Collection, Album 5 (Daybook Volume 5), 1861-62, number 6506, albumen print. Sitting at the photographer’s studio, 38 Porchester Terrace, Bayswater, London.
[Four other Silvy portraits (shown below) can be seen at the National Portrait Gallery’s Silvy pages. From left to right: Emma Hall-Dare (Mabel’s aunt, who married Thomas Hilton Bothamley (1805-1874 in c. 1842); Agnes Hall-Dare (Mabel’s aunt); Agatha Hall-Dare (Mabel’s aunt by marriage, Agatha being the first wife of Mabel’s uncle Henry. She was the daughter of Samuel Trehawke Kekewich and died 12 February 1878); Robert Westley Hall-Dare (Mabel’s brother – there are more photos of him above. In his unpublished diaries he refers to the photographer: 24/1/1862: “Went with Uncle Charles to Silvy and was photographed.”; 7/2/1862: “Silvy sent 18 of my photos today, which I distributed judiciously.”)].
A typical word-portrait of Mabel Bent reads mostly along the lines of this one, from the ‘Anglo-African Who’s Who’ (Wills and Barrett (eds), 1905):
‘BENT, Mrs. Mabel Virginia Anna, of 13, Great Cumberland Place, W., and of the Ladies’ Empire Club, is a daughter of Robert Westley Hall-Dare, D.L., of Theydon Bois, Wennington Hall, Essex, and Newtownbarry House, Co. Wexford. She was married Aug. 2, 1877, to the late Theodore Bent, of Baildon House, Yorks. Mrs. Bent accompanied her husband in all his explorations, and took part in the excavations with which he was associated in the Greek and Turkish Islands, Asia Minor, Abyssinia, the Great Zimbabye (Mashonaland), Persia, and elsewhere. She is the authoress of ‘Southern Arabia, Soudan, and Sokotra,’ compiled from her own and Mr. Theodore Bent’s notes.’
Mabel Virginia Anna Bent. Reproduced from ‘Hearth and Home’, 2 November 1893. From the Studio of H.S. Mendelssohn, South Kensington (private collection).
But we are lucky that there exists a very rare autobiographical snapshot of her earliest years – appearing in the gossipy rag ‘Mainly about People’. A lengthy extract here conjures her up [ed note: Mabel Virginia Anna Hall-Dare was born (January 1847) and raised among the minor Anglo-Irish aristocracy]:
‘My baby eyes first looked out on an extremely beautiful bit of this world, for I was born at Beauparc, in the county of Meath, my grandfather Gustavus Lambart’s place, which, being situated on a very high bank at a sharp curve of the River Boyne, seems as if it were upon an island looking straight down the river. The right bank is high and wooded, and the left has a narrow grassy flat between the water and a low craggy cliff, above which you see away over tree-studded fields to a ruined castle with woods beyond; and my eyes, which have since been so much exercised in seeking for archaeological sites where to make excavations, must also have fallen on the wonderful ancient tumulus of New Grange. So much did this view please me the first time I can remember seeing it, that, having arrived in the dark one night, the following morning about four or five o’clock my wretched mother was startled from her sleep by shrieks and shouts to find me jumping up and down as hard as I could at the window, a manifestation of my ecstasy of delight at the sight of the snow and icicles and all the wintry beauty spread before me.
‘Beauparc – Lady Lambert’s House’. Mabel Hall-Dare was born here, in County Meath, Ireland, on January 28, 1847. From a watercolour by Garrett Scanlan. (Reproduced with the artist’s permission)
‘Although I certainly had no inkling of the fate that awaited me, being a ‘Thursday’s bairn who has far to go’, no child was ever fonder of reading and poring over maps and lists and pictures of traveller’s requisites than I was… I was also a most determined dweller in tents, for I used to pull my bed to pieces and hang up my top sheet by the nail of a picture, making a good hole that it should hold well, and then, arranging my bedding to suit my fancy, imagine I was sleeping on the ground. It was not comfortable, but there was something very nice about it. In one of my investigations of the library at home I came upon a book that I made up my mind to examine. It had a delightful title ‘The Atlas of Undiscovered Countries’. It was firmly fixed, and to get at it I had to exert all my strength and become very hot, tugging out the great folios that were on each side, and then to my disgust I found my prize was only a false wooden book to support the upper shelf. Years after I exclaimed, ‘Now I have really an atlas of undiscovered countries of my own’, when I eagerly unpacked a map in eight sheets (that my husband had had made at Stanford’s, of Southern Arabia, when we were first thinking of exploring that part of the world) and found two or three of the sheets blank save for latitude and longitude marks. I am glad to say that the blank is not so large now…
‘Some very strange things have been written in the way of description of the dress I wore when travelling in outlandish places – just a shooting dress. The accounts are such that my friends refuse to believe in my photographs, as they in no way tally with what they have read. One paper had it that I wore a spiked helmet, whereas what goes by the name of my pith helmet is of rather a large mushroom shape. All this is very amusing to me. A statement which delighted the whole of my family was one that ‘Mrs. Theodore Bent is never tired of expatiating on the sagacity of the horse, and its superiority in this respect to the mule or the camel’. Against whose attacks have I had to defend the ‘noble animal’. The first intimation of this came to me suddenly when I opened a magazine in a boatful of strangers in Aden Harbour. My husband, who had landed first to seek a dwelling on our return from Dhofar, had sent my mail (some months’ accumulation) on board. I nearly went into hysterics, tears rolled down my cheeks, the various coloured fellow-passengers stared, but I could not control my mirth nor explain the cause of its sudden outburst. After all, in a residence of a week or ten days at Aden, which has been my unfortunate fate seven or eight times, one is glad of anything to cheer one up. On this occasion we were so lucky as to be able to hire an unlet shop, where we set up our camp in dust that never could be swept up, and by night slept in the surrounding dens, alive with bugs, and those horrid ‘fish moths’, which are rather like earwigs, and eat cloth, linen, paper, ivory – in fact, everything but metal. Our servants cooked at various fires in the inner yard according to their religion, and spread their beds on the floor of the shop at night. Neither window shutters nor doors could be kept open or shut for lack of fastening, and slammed and banged to and fro incessantly. What we could not help we tried not to heed, and only rejoiced that we were masters of our own kitchen and could feed as we pleased much better than in the hotels. I really was once taken for a man, and caused a terrible commotion as I entered a Turkish bath filled with ladies about whose costume there is nothing to tell. I had on a tight fitting ulster and a hat, and the waist and the hat and the long coat made me really look very like a Persian man…
‘My youth was spent partly in England, but mostly in Ireland, my father having property in both countries, and we were often taken abroad for a summer or a winter. This is certainly the best way of learning languages, of which I was fortunately always very fond. It was a great help when it was necessary for me to look up references in various tongues and in old manuscripts. I have often been in places where I have heard no English at all. It would have astonished me very much in the days of my youth if I had been told that I should ever abide for some time in the Republic of San Marino and become a citizen of it. The diploma was sent after my husband had written a history of the Republic (‘A Freak of Freedom’), and he received a letter subsequently from a friend beginning, ‘Dear Sir and Fellow Citizen,’ congratulating him, and reminding him that ‘no matter at what distance he might lie from the Republic, he would be under her protection.’
Mabel Bent on a camel in the Sudan in 1896 (detail from a lantern-slide in the RGS, London).
‘It was lucky that I was so well used to riding, as I have had so much of it on horses, donkeys, mules, camels, and even elephants. I do not mind camel-riding at all, and really like it when I trot. However, no matter what I do abroad, when necessity compels, in the way of blacking boots, cobbling them, covering umbrellas, or mending their ribs, washing clothes, soldering cooking-pots, or ‘washing up’ (which last I hate), I try to live it down in after life, and when I am at home to enjoy the privileges of civilisation, to wear dresses of whatever length fashion desires of me, and hats that will pass in a crowd. I cannot understand the feeling which makes people wish to disguise themselves as travellers when at home. Certainly I have been granted some of the wishes that I made in the days of my youth!’ (Mabel Virginia Anna Bent)
Dear archaeologists, anthropologists, ethnographers, folklorists, travel-lovers: now you can bluff your way in the Bents’ 20 years of explorations in just three all-you-need-to-know clicks!
STEP 1 = Our interactive map of Theodore and Mabel’s journeys in the Eastern Med and Iran (a second map featuring their African and Arabian tours will follow)!
We are delighted to update this post with a wonderful addition to the Bent Archive gallery – at last, the lost oil! And by way of tribute to a real artist – ‘Miss J. D. S. Aldworth’ !
Leave a comment or contact us about this article
