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At the Sick Man's Door
Fred Walker
1862
Wood-engraving by Joseph Swain
16.9 cm high by 11.4 cm wide, framed
W. M. Thackeray, The Adventures of Philip, serialized in The Cornhill Magazine (1862).
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Scanned image and text by Philip V. Allingham
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Walker’s interpretation of Thackeray’s text was the foundation stone of his career, and he went on to provide distinguished work for a number of novels and gift-books. — Illustrating Thackeray: Frederick Walker and Philip — Simon Cooke.
Walker developed the watercolour At the Sick Man's Door from an illustration that he provided for the serialisation of William Makepeace Thackeray's The Adventures of Philip in The Cornhill Magazine, vol. 5, p. 129, February 1862. Thackeray, then the editor of journal, himself illustrated the first few installments, but, having met Walker in January 1861, he made the young artist his protegé, giving him the commissions for the periodical illustrations from the May 1861 number. Walker produced a full series of woodcuts, ranging from iinitial letter vignettes to full-page compositions, several of which, including the celebrated Philip in Church and At the Sick Man's Door, served as the basis for Walker's designs for the finished watercolours.
In The Adventures of Philip, Thackeray's last completed novel, many of the principal characters have already appeared in his earlier novels. Pendennis, Thackeray's hero of the previous decade, narrates the story of his young friend Philip, a struggling journalist whose fortunes are overshadowed by his father's hidden past. At this point in the story, Philip has fallen in love with Charlotte Baynes, daughter of the dying military officer whose bedroom the couple visit in this illustration. General Baynes is a trustee of Philip's inheritance, but he and his wife strenuously oppose Philip's marrying Charlotte.
In Walker's illustration, the protagonist, Philip, and his companion, Charlotte, are about to enter the sickroom of her father, General Baynes. Beyond the door, "with hot tearless eyes and livid face, a wretched sentinel outside the sick chamber," Mrs. Baynes waits to learn of her husband's condition from the young couple, here about to enter. With pensive expression, Philip waits in anxiety as 'little Char' gently turns the door-handle, like Philip turning her eyes away from the interrogative glance of Mrs. Baynes, seated beside the door. The liminal situation involves anxiety and fear of the known for the general's visitors, so that neither the unwelcome future son-in-law nor the daughter knows what kind of reception they will receive, especially since the dying man fully appreciates the stress that Charlotte has suffered as a result of his rejection of Philip. Unexpectedly, Thackeray's General Baynes actually welcomes the young couple, acknowledges his error, and confers his paternal blessing upon their anticipated union.
As Claude Phillips remarks of this and several other illustrations in the Cornhill series, here Walker succeeded in "illustrating the vein of true sentiment without sentimentality which gives distinction to the whole series" (15). Adding colour, Walker changes the overall mood of the composition in the water-colour At the Sick Man's Door (1862).
Marks, John George. Life and Letters of Frederick Walker, A. R. A.. London and New York: Macmillan, 1896.
Phillips, Claude. At the Sick Man's Door by Walker. Frederick Walker and His Works. London: Seeley & Co., 1905 [re-issue of the 1894 edition], facing page 17.
Reid, Forrest. Illustrators of the Eighteen Sixties: An Illustrated Survey of the Work of 58 British Artists. New York: Dover, 1975. Originally published by Faber and Gwyer in London, 1928, as Illustrators of the Sixties.
Thackeray, W. M. The Adventures of Philip, serialized in The Cornhill Magazine. London: Smith Elder, January 1861-August 1862.
Walker, Fred. "At the Sick Man's Door." "Frederick Walker - At the Sick Man's Door; an illustration to Thackeray's 'Adventures of Philip'," in British Paintings since about Victorian times (roughly 1837 on), 29 August 2010. Online version available from http://goldenagepaintings.blogspot.com. Web. 13 July 2018.
Last modified 28 July 2018