Henry Thomas Alken (1785 – 1851)
English painter Henry Thomas Alken was born in 1785 in Soho, Westminster. The son of painter Samuel Alken, the artist took his first education from his father and worked as a book painter in various newspapers in London. He paid attention with his unique works. He received graphics and miniature lessons from the famous miniature painter John Thomas Barber Beaumont.
From about 1816 onwards Alken “produced an unending stream of paintings, drawings and engravings of every type of field and other sporting activity,” and his soft-ground etchings were often colored by hand. When Alken was 26, he and his young family lived over a shop in Haymarket that belonged to print publisher Thomas McLean of the “Repository of Wit and Humour.” McLean paid Alken a daily wage of thirty shillings, considered a good income at the time
In addition, Alken, a book painter and engraver, made animal figures by printing on plates and watercolors, horses, and battle scenes on newspapers or paper. After receiving his miniature education, he was present in the sportscasters, as well as playing the prizes, as well as displaying some of the scenes from the shows by printing on the plate for the National Sports of Great Britain. In 1981, he made six ridiculous engravings of How to Qualify for a Meltonian.
