Background
Known as Herbert by his family, he was born in Dorchester, Dorset. His father Review Henry Everett was Rector of Holy Trinity in Dorchester and his mother, Augusta Stewart (also known as Aurelia) could trace her maternal ancestry back to Viscount Sackville, third son of the Duke of Dorset and her paternal to the 7th Earl of Galloway and the 7th Earl of Wemyss. In the autumn of 1896 after his father died, Everett went to London to enroll at the Slade School of Fine Artist
Education
Slade School of Fine Artist
Career
On 18 August 1876. After studying briefly at the Académie Julian in Paris, Everett"s life took an unconventional path when he embarked on the first of his 16 sea voyages. Back in London in 1899, Everett returned to the Slade, working and socializing with his fellow students who formed part of London"s cafe society. They all went on painting excursions to Cornwall and France, and these trips had a profound effect on their work.
The plates were meant to be published in a book by American writer Ernest Brennecke, but the book was banned in Britain through intervention by Hardy himself, who felt it was too inaccurate.
The trip took 117 days and was intended as an opportunity for John Everett to paint, but according to his wife"s autobiography it was "..the one thing he had not done and never did on that voyage."
Around 1904 the Herberts moved to Wool in Dorset, renting the Manor House that belonged to a Mistress Drax and had been the home of the Turbervilles.
Because of this they were visited by Thomas Hardy and Katherine, herself also an artist, copied the frescos from the Manor House"s walls which were reproduced in his novel. lieutenant was at Wool that the Everett"s first son Henry was born in 1904.
He was an ill child who initially failed to thrive and Katherine was left to look after him on her own.
Some time in 1906/7 the couple moved to Corfe Castle, where they rented a mill house called Arfleet. In her autobiography Katherine mentions the execution of this painting, and how neither she or the artist considered it a success, but rather "a confused failure". The Everetts spent several years at Arfleet, but had to move when claypit excavations nearby threatened to undermine the house.
They bought land at Broadstone and designed and built their own home, called Prospect.
In Katherine"s own words "In the past if things had been uncomfortable, as for instance directly after my babies were born, Herbert went away, perhaps to Paris or Cornwall or I might not know where he was. In 1918 he joined the Merchant Navy as a Seaman.
His rank was Fourth Officer. He died in London.
Membership
He signed on in the London docks, as a working member of the crew of the sailing ship, Iquique, in 1898, travelling to Sydney and returning in 1899.