Background
Bartholomew was born on July 8, 1822, in Colchester, Connecticut.
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Edward Sheffield Bartholomew
Edit ProfileEducation
After spending the first fourteen years of his life at Colchester, Connecticut, where he attended the Bacon Academy, moved with his parents, Abial Lord and Sarah Gustin, to Hartford. The change made him shy; even in after life he found it difficult to meet strangers. He worked as assistant, first to a bookbinder, then to a dentist, but was dissatisfied and was regarded somewhat as a vagabond by the thrifty people among whom he lived. To escape the uncongenial atmosphere he went to New York, and for a year studied in the "Antique and Life School" of the Academy of Design.
Career
On his return to Hartford he became curator of the Wadsworth Gallery and at the same time continued his art work. He soon discovered, however, that he was color-blind. Bitterly disappointed, he turned to sculpture, for even as a boy he had been fond of modeling in clay. He first attempted, with inadequate tools, a medallion of Mrs. Sigourney; then, with better implements, a bust of "Flora. " In 1848 he went again to New York to attend a series of anatomical lectures. While there he contracted smallpox, followed by a hip affection which crippled him. Hitherto he had been strong and vigorous, and of prepossessing appearance - tall and dark, but after this calamity he was lame and unwell for the rest of his brief life.
Shortly after this an opportunity to go to Italy came and he departed in 1850. Thereafter he made but two visits to America, on one of which he superintended the erection of his monument to Charles Carroll. In Rome he began, with a bas-relief of "Homer led by the Genius of Poetry, " the productive period of his life. He studied under Ferrero, working particularly at bas-relief. His first year in Rome was an uphill struggle, but after a four months' journey to Athens and the Near East, he began to win recognition. His most admired work was a statue of "Eve Repentant. " Though frequently using biblical subjects ("Paradise Lost"; "Hagar and Ishmael"; "Ruth, Naomi and Orpah"), he more generally resorted to classical themes ("Sappho"; "Calypso"; "Ganymede"; "Diana"; "Belisarius"). He likewise did numerous portraits, such as those of the Colts and their children. True to contemporary American taste and to Italian teaching he was thoroughly neo-classic in the treatment of subject, though fonder of introducing superfluous and picturesque accessories than was Canova or Thorwaldsen. His execution was not always adequate, but this fault he was overcoming when, shortly after his return from his second American trip, he was taken ill. On the advice of his physician he went to Naples, but only to die.
