Description:

Vanity Fair 1868 - 1914
An amazing original Vanity Fair cartoon by Robert George Duff, poking fun at the 1897 South Africa Inquiry and Sir William Harcourt




An original cartoon, signed "G.C.D. 1897" in pencil, accomplished in pencil, ink, watercolor and gray wash,9.75" x 13.75", entitled "'The Great Inquisitor," depicting Sir William Vernon Harcourt (1827-1904) reclining in an easy chair beneath a map of southern Africa, seated opposite an unidentified mustached gentleman holding an umbrella, hat, and briefcase. Trimmed at right margin, affecting "7" in "1897," mounting remnants on verso, else fine condition.

The caption below the title reads in full: "The Sir William [Harcourt], with a preliminary cough, which seemed to say 'now I have got you in a tight corner' insinuated 'but you went to a cabinet meeting" No I didn't' replied the witness 'the cabinet came to me' Laughter broke out round the Room." In 1897, Sir William V. Harcourt, the leader of the Liberal Party, then in opposition, helped lead an official inquiry into an armed incursion into the South African republic of Transvaal by employees of the British South Africa Company in 1895 known as the Jameson Raid. The raid was intended to spur a revolt among disaffected workers in the gold-fields as part of a move to expand British control of South Africa and gain access to the region's rich gold and diamond reserves. The raid was one of the chief causes of the Second Boer War of 1899 to 1902.

Sir Robert George Duff (1851-1914) was a longtime artist for Vanity Fair.

Provenance: from the Estate of Charles Sigety.

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