The hulk 'Gloucester' and HMS 'Volage' at Chatham<br>
Inscribed below the ships, 'Volage' (left) and 'Gloucester'. This study shows the old 'wooden-wall' 'Gloucester'  in bow view, while in service as a receiving ship on the Medway at Chatham Dockyard from 1861 to 1884, when she was sold for breaking.  She was built as a 74-gun third- rate, launched on  27 February 1812, and was cut down (razeed) to a fourth rate of 50 guns in 1831.  In the left background, shown drying sails, is the iron screw corvette 'Volage' (1869), built by the Thames Iron Shipbuilding Co at Blackwall and  launched on 27 February 1869: whether Wyllie was aware of the coincidence of launch dates in making the drawing is not known, but possible. PAF 2024 is another view of the 'Gloucester' by him, moored alongside the Anchor Wharf storehouses at Chatham and both drawings relate to his more developed and large oil painting of  'The  "Gloucester hulk" at Chatham', now in the Royal Naval Museum, Portsmouth. The pictures relate to the period when Wyllie lived at Hooe, overlooking the Medway on the west side, a little downstream from Chatham
<bdi><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/en:William_Lionel_Wyllie" class="extiw" title="w:en:William Lionel Wyllie"><span title="English painter of maritime themes (1851-1931)">William Lionel Wyllie</span></a>
</bdi>
circa 1880 <div style="display: none;">date QS:P571,+1880-00-00T00:00:00Z/9,P1480,Q5727902</div>
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