John Frederick Tayler

(John) Frederick Tayler (30 April 1802 – 20 June 1889) was a 19th-century English landscape watercolour painter, and president of the Royal Watercolour Society. Personal Frederick was the son of a country gentleman, Archdale Wilson Tayler and his wife Frances Eliza, and was born at Boreham Wood, Elstree, Hertfordshire, on 30 April 1802. His siblings included Henry Joseph (b.1787), Elisa (b.1789), Sarah Maria (b.1790), Susannah Matilda (b.1791), Julia (b.1793), George Robert (b. 1795), Charles (b.1796), Anna Frances (b.1797), Emily Susan (b.1799), Thomas Edward (b.1799), Joseph Francis (b. 1805), Joseph Edward (b. 1807), William (b. 1808). The elder Tayler was ruined by the dishonesty of an agent, and entered the army. He died while Frederick was still a child, leaving a widow and seventeen children, several of whom rose to a certain eminence in their careers. William Tayler, commissioner of Patna in India, was a younger brother. The family had influential friends and some clerical interest. Education Frederick's uncle, Charles Henry Hall, was dean of Christ Church, Oxford, and the boy was educated successively at Eton College and Harrow School, and destined for the church. He soon, however, showed his strong artistic bent, and, in spite of domestic opposition, determined to become a painter.