Identity:

Alphonse-Marie De Neuville was a painter of battle scenes and an illustrator.

Life:

Neuville, who studied under Picot and Eugène Delacroix, made his début at the Salon of 1859 with Le 5e bataillon de chasseurs à la batterie Gervais (siège de Sébastopol), for which he received a third class medal. He came to be regarded as one of France's great military painters.

Matthew Robinson Elden wrote to JW in 1880 concerning the 112nd Exhibition of the Royal Academy of Arts and the IV Summer Exhibition at the Grosvenor Gallery: 'I suppose you will see Miss Thompson who paints the Battle of Rorkes drift in the Zulu business - when she saw - so people say the frenchman De Neuville's work exhibited at Huish's of the same subject [she] turned quite sick - & obtained the Queens request of 3 weeks more time sending her frame to the Academy in the interim' (#01048).

Bibliography:

Bénézit, E., Dictionnaire des Peintres, Sculpteurs, Dessinateurs et Graveurs, Paris, 1956-61; Grove Dictionary of Art Online, http://www.groveart.com (accessed 2004).