Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 62.djvu/89

 ability he made himself known, and became the friend of Hogarth, George Lambert [q. v.], and other leading painters. In August 1746 he visited Dublin, and in the spring of 1748 returned to Ireland to paint some portraits for which he had received commissions. He remained there till 1750, when he went back to London, and established himself in Great Queen Street, Lincoln's Inn Fields, in the house previously occupied by Sir Godfrey Kneller [q. v.], to which he afterwards added the adjoining house, formerly the dwelling of the great physician John Radcliffe (1650–1714) [q. v.] Among his first sitters were Martin Folkes [q. v.], Lord Orrery, Lord Chesterfield, David Garrick, Samuel Foote, and in 1759 John Hadley, the physician. In Great Queen Street also he painted Garrick as Romeo and Miss Bellamy as Juliet in the tomb scene; the picture was engraved by Robert Laurie. His reputation as a portrait-painter steadily increased, and it is said that he enjoyed an income of 1,500l., and declined partnership with Hogarth. John Zoffany [q. v.] painted draperies for him, and, according to common belief, frequently rendered him more material assistance (cf., Nollekens and his Times, 1828, ii. 134).

Among Wilson's portraits may be mentioned those of John Parsons in the National Gallery, of the poet Gray at Pembroke College, Cambridge, of Lord Lyttelton, Lord Mexbrough, Sir Francis Delaval, Lord Scarbrough, Clive, the Marquis of Rockingham, and two of Sir George Savile at Osberton and at Rufford. He painted a portrait of Shakespeare for the town-hall at Stratford on the jubilee of 1769; and in 1779, on the outbreak of the Spanish war, he executed a statue of Queen Elizabeth on horseback, which was placed in the Spanish armoury at the Tower. Several of his works were engraved, among them Garrick as Hamlet, Benjamin Franklin, and Simon, earl Harcourt, by James McArdell; Rockingham, John Thomas, bishop of Winchester, and Romeo and Juliet by Richard Houston; Garrick as King Lear and Lady Stanhope as the Fair Penitent by Basire; and John Dolland by John Raphael Smith. He made several drawings after pictures by the old masters for Alderman John Boydell [q. v.] He also engraved in mezzotint, and of his etchings have been preserved a portrait of Lady Harriet after Francis Cotes and a portrait from life of Maria Gunning dated 1751.

Wilson, who was a student of chemistry, took a great interest in the problems of electricity, and in 1746 he published ‘An Essay towards an Explication of the Phænomena of Electricity deduced from the Æther of Sir Isaac Newton’ (London, 8vo), which he followed in 1750 by ‘A Treatise on Electricity’ (London, 8vo; 2nd edit. 1752). He invented and exhibited a large electrical apparatus, and on 5 Dec. 1751 was elected a fellow of the Royal Society. In conjunction with the physician Benjamin Hoadly (1706–1757) [q. v.] he carried on other electrical researches, the results of which were made public in ‘Observations on a Series of Electrical Experiments’ (London, 1756, 4to; 2nd edit. 1759). About 1757 he visited France, and repeated many of his experiments at St. Germain-en-Laye. He had a long controversy with Benjamin Franklin on the question whether lightning-conductors should be round or pointed at the top, and was supported in his view by George III, who declared his experiments were sufficient to convince the apple-women in Covent Garden. He was nominated by the Royal Society to serve on a committee to regulate the erection of lightning-conductors on St. Paul's Cathedral, and was requested by the board of ordnance at a later period to inspect the gunpowder magazines at Purfleet. In 1760 he received the gold medal of the Royal Society for his electrical experiments. His reputation as an electrician won him many friends among contemporary men of science both at home and on the continent (cf. Ann. Reg. 1760 i. 149, 1761 i. 128–9, 1769 i. 85).

In 1760 and 1761 Wilson exhibited portraits in the Spring Gardens rooms. About this time the versatility of his talents gained him an influential patron. Through Sir John Savile, earl of Mexborough, he became known to the Duke of York, and won his favour as manager of his private theatre in James Street, Westminster. On the death of Hogarth in 1764 he succeeded him as serjeant-painter; and on the death of James Worsdale [q. v.] in 1767 the Duke of York procured for him the appointment of painter to the board of ordnance. He shared the emoluments of the position with Worsdale's natural son until 1779, when his colleague died, and he received a complete investment of the office. In 1767 Wilson lost his great patron by death; but in 1776 he attracted the notice of the king, who, after carefully ascertaining that he was not the landscape-painter Richard Wilson [q. v.], treated him with great kindness, patronised his electrical researches, and encouraged him to come to Windsor.

Wilson, according to a friendly critic, endeavoured to introduce a new style of chiaroscuro into his paintings, and his heads had