Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Batty, Robert (d.1848)
BATTY, ROBERT (d. 1848), lieutenant-colonel and amateur draughtsman, was the son of Dr. Batty, of Hastings [q. v.] At the age of fifteen he went to Italy, and was able there to cultivate his natural fondness for art. He was educated at Caius College, Cambridge. He entered first for the army, but afterwards returned to Cambridge and took the M.B. degree in 1813. After this, however, he served with the grenadier guards in the campaign in the western Pyrenees, and at Waterloo. He published an account of these exploits in a quarto volume, with plates etched by himself, and called ‘The Campaign of the Left Wing of the Allied Army in the Western Pyrenees and South of France, 1813–14.’ This was followed by ‘A Sketch of the Campaign of 1815.’ He published also several volumes of the scenery of different countries: ‘French Scenery,’ 1822; ‘German Scenery’ and ‘Welsh Scenery,’ 1823; ‘Scenery of the Rhine, Belgium and Holland,’ 1826; ‘Hanoverian, Saxon, and Danish Scenery,’ 1828; ‘Scenery in India,’ and ‘Select Views of the principal Cities of Europe,’ 1830–33. He exhibited at the Royal Academy at different times between 1825 and 1832. He died in London on 20 Nov. 1848. ‘His industry was great, his works carefully and truthfully drawn, his architecture correct in its proportions and outlines’ (Redgrave). His sister is stated to have published a series of views of Italian scenery.
[Ottley's Supplement to Bryan's Dictionary of Painters, 1866; Redgrave's Dictionary of Artists of the English School, 1878.]