O-692

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painting (portrait)

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The Honourable Alexander McDonell (Collachie)

Portrait of Speaker Alexander McDonell of Collachie

Alexander McDonell of Collachie was born in Scotland in 1762, and his family emigrated to North America in 1773. During the American Revolution he was jailed as a Loyalist for three years. A friendship with Governor John Graves Simcoe brought him to York, and in 1800 he was elected to the assembly. He became a militia colonel in the War of 1812 and was captured and jailed for another year. With varying success, he held various appointments over the years, including a directorship of the Bank of Upper Canada. He died in 1842, and his portrait was painted posthumously by Théophile Hamel.

Théophile Hamel

Théophile Hamel was born in 1817 in Sainte-Foy, Quebec, and studied art in Quebec and in many of the great cultural centres of Europe. He was an astute business man and a tremendously successful artist, and the National Gallery of Canada calls him “one of early Canada’s greatest portrait painters.” In 1853 the government of the United Canadas appointed him official portrait painter, and tasked him with creating portraits of all Speakers since 1791, many of which were copied from portraits held by families or elsewhere. His subjects also included the generals Montcalm and Wolfe, and many other eminent figures of early Canada.