Note: key to sketches 1 to 600 in OU 1832/28.
John Doyle 1797 - 1868.
John Doyle was born into a impoverished Roman Catholic family in Dublin in 1797. Doyle arrived in London in 1821 where he hoped to establish himself as a portrait painter. Although he occasionally exhibited at the Royal Academy he failed to sell enough pictures and by 1827 had turned to lithography. Over the next few years he revolutionised the art of caricature, concentrating mainly on politicians for his subjects. His work differed greatly from previous cartoonists such as Thomas Rowlandson (1756 - 1827) and James Gillray (1757 - 1815) who attempted to make their subjects look ugly and ridiculous.
Doyle's pictures appeared in The Times between 1829 and 1851. His drawings were always signed HB and at the time very few people knew his real name. Doyle's cartoons were daily commentaries of political events and were sometimes accompanied by an article explaining their meaning. He died on 2nd January 1868. One of his sons, Richard Doyle (1824 - 1883), was also a cartoonist. His other son, Charles, was the father of the writer, Arthur Conan Doyle (1859 - 1930), who created the fictional character Sherlock Holmes.
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