Old House in Little Moor Fields

This watercolour depicts a gable of a building in Moorfields which has a distinctive foliated decoration and which is likely to be derived from drawings by Charles Bigot made in c. 1849 and John Thomas Smith, the latter appearing as an etching in Smith's Ancient Topography of London, 1814. The houses were pulled down in 1854 which may be why they had attracted the interest of Stewart. They were believed to date from the reign of Charles I.

Very little is known about James Lawson Stewart who exhibited watercolours in various London galleries between 1883-1889. He died in c. 1918 and towards the end of life was employed to copy prints of London; the accuracy of some of the locations should therefore be questioned.

The Museum was gifted a large selection of watercolours featuring locations which appeared in Dickens's works in 1934 and a set of cigarette cards was issued by R and J Hill Ltd in 1926 and 1934 entitled Historic Places from Dickens Classics which featured watercolours by Stewart.