Henry Graves (17 July 1806 – 23 August 1892) was a printseller and publisher. Family vault of Henry Graves in Highgate Cemetery

Life

He was son of Robert Graves (died 1825), and younger brother of the engraver

Robert Graves Captain Robert von Ranke Graves (24 July 1895 – 7 December 1985) was a British poet, historical novelist and critic. His father was Alfred Perceval Graves, a celebrated Irish poet and figure in the Gaelic revival; they were both Celtic ...

, A.R.A. He was born on 16 July 1806. At the age of sixteen he became an assistant of Samuel Woodburn, the art dealer, and later was employed by Messrs. Hurst, Robinson, & Co., the successors of Boydell, as manager of their print department. On the failure of this firm in 1825, Graves, in conjunction with Francis Graham Moon and J. Boys, acquired the business which was carried on with various changes of partnership until 1844, when Graves became sole proprietor ; the title of the firm has since been Henry Graves & Co. He also had a print publishing partnership, Hodgson & Graves, with Richard Hodgson. In the course of an enterprising and successful career, throughout which he was recognised as the leading London printseller, Graves published an immense number of fine engravings from pictures by Turner, Wilkie, Lawrence, Constable, Landseer, Faed, Frith, Grant, Millais, and other contemporary painters. He specially devoted himself to the reproduction of the works of Sir

Edwin Landseer Sir Edwin Henry Landseer (7 March 1802 – 1 October 1873) was an English painter and sculptor, well known for his paintings of animals – particularly horses, dogs, and stags. However, his best-known works are the lion sculptures at the bas ...

, employing upon the work the best engravers of the day, and paying the artist himself more than £50,000 for copyrights. He also issued valuable library editions of the works of Reynolds, Lawrence, Gainsborough, Liverseege, and Landseer. Graves was one of the founders of ''

The Art Journal ''The Art Journal'' was the most important British 19th-century magazine on art. It was founded in 1839 by Hodgson & Graves, print publishers, 6 Pall Mall, with the title ''Art Union Monthly Journal'' (or ''The Art Union''), the first issue of 7 ...

'' and the ''Illustrated London News,'' an active member of the Printsellers' Association and the Artists' General Benevolent Fund, and a governor of the Shakespeare memorial at Stratford. He died at his house on

Pall Mall, London Pall Mall is a street in the St James's area of the City of Westminster, Central London. It connects St James's Street to Trafalgar Square and is a section of the regional A4 road. The street's name is derived from pall-mall, a ...

, on 23 August 1892, and was buried in

Highgate cemetery Highgate Cemetery is a place of burial in north London, England. There are approximately 170,000 people buried in around 53,000 graves across the West and East Cemeteries. Highgate Cemetery is notable both for some of the people buried there as ...

Family

By his first wife, Mary Squire (died 1871), Graves had two sons, Boydell Graves and Algernon Graves, the latter of whom was chairman of the company to which the business was transferred in 1896.

References

;Attribution Publishers (people) from London 1806 births 1892 deaths Burials at Highgate Cemetery 19th-century English businesspeople {{printmaking-stub