John Chaloner Smith (19 August 1827 – 13 March 1895) was an Irish civil engineer, remembered as collector of and writer on British

mezzotint Mezzotint is a monochrome printmaking process of the '' intaglio'' family. It was the first printing process that yielded half-tones without using line- or dot-based techniques like hatching, cross-hatching or stipple. Mezzotint achieves tonali ...

Life

Smith was born in

Dublin Dublin (; , or ) is the capital and largest city of Republic of Ireland, Ireland. On a bay at the mouth of the River Liffey, it is in the Provinces of Ireland, province of Leinster, bordered on the south by the Dublin Mountains, a part of th ...

in 1827. His father was a proctor of the ecclesiastical courts, and married a granddaughter of Travers Hartley, M.P. for Dublin in the Irish parliament. Chaloner Smith was admitted to

Trinity College, Dublin , name_Latin = Collegium Sanctae et Individuae Trinitatis Reginae Elizabethae juxta Dublin , motto = ''Perpetuis futuris temporibus duraturam'' (Latin) , motto_lang = la , motto_English = It will last i ...

, in 1846, and in 1849 graduated B.A. He was articled to George Willoughby Hemans the engineer, and in 1857 was appointed engineer to the

Waterford and Limerick Railway The Waterford, Limerick and Western Railway (WL&WR), formerly the Waterford and Limerick Railway up to 1896, was at the time it was amalgamated with the Great Southern and Western Railway in 1901 the fourth largest railway in Ireland, with a mai ...

. In 1868 he took a similar position in the

Dublin, Wicklow and Wexford Railway The Dublin and South Eastern Railway (DSER), often referred to as the Slow and Easy, was an Irish gauge () railway in Ireland from 1846 to 1925. It carried 4,626,226 passengers in 1911. It was the fourth largest railway operation in Ireland ope ...

, and held it till 1894. He carried out some major extensions of the line, and was mainly responsible for the

Loopline Bridge The Loopline Bridge (or the ''Liffey Viaduct'') is a railway bridge spanning the River Liffey and several streets in Dublin, Ireland. It joins rail services from south of Dublin to Connolly Station and lines north. Designed by John Chaloner Sm ...

crossing the

River Liffey The River Liffey (Irish: ''An Life'', historically ''An Ruirthe(a)ch'') is a river in eastern Ireland that ultimately flows through the centre of Dublin to its mouth within Dublin Bay. Its major tributaries include the River Dodder, the River ...

, connecting the Great Northern and South-Eastern railways of Ireland. He died at

Bray, County Wicklow Bray ( ) is a coastal town in north County Wicklow, Ireland. It is situated about south of Dublin city centre on the east coast. It has a population of 32,600 making it the ninth largest urban area within Ireland (at the 2016 census). Bray is ...

Works

His ''British Mezzotinto Portraits … with Biographical Notes'' (London, 1878–84, 4 pts.) consists of a full catalogue of plates executed before 1820, with 125 autotypes from plates in Smith's possession. The latter were also issued separately. This "remains the definitive catalogue of the subject". The print-room at the

British Museum The British Museum is a public museum dedicated to human history, art and culture located in the Bloomsbury area of London. Its permanent collection of eight million works is among the largest and most comprehensive in existence. It docum ...

contains an interleaved copy with manuscript notes. Smith was a collector of engravings, principally mezzotints, which were sold after the completion of his book in sales between 1887 and 1896. Some 300 of them, especially those by Irish printmakers, were purchased for the

National Gallery of Ireland The National Gallery of Ireland ( ga, Gailearaí Náisiúnta na hÉireann) houses the national collection of Irish and European art. It is located in the centre of Dublin with one entrance on Merrion Square, beside Leinster House, and another on ...

in Dublin through Sir Edward Guinness, and the

bought 106.Griffiths, 139 Chaloner Smith took an interest in the financial relations between England and Ireland, and published pamphlets on the subject. Just before his death he was examined before the Royal Commission which was appointed to consider the question.

Notes

References

* *Antony Griffiths (ed), ''Landmarks in Print Collecting - Connoisseurs and Donors at the British Museum since 1753'', p. 138, 1996, British Museum Press, ;Attribution {{DEFAULTSORT:Smith, John Chaloner 1827 births 1895 deaths Irish engineers Irish art collectors Irish writers