Dictionary of Indian Biography/Benwell, Joseph Austin
BENWELL, JOSEPH AUSTIN ( ? - ? )
Artist: resided for some time, prior to 1856, in India: conspicuous for original and pleasing delineations of native life, landscape and buildings in India, evidently drawn on the spot: chiefly known as a draughtsman on wood of Eastern subjects, principally Indian and Chinese: exhibited at the Royal Academy up to 1883: illustrated Capt. M. Rafter's Our Indian Army, and Capper's Three Presidencies of India: nearly all his drawings on wood are in the periodicals and journals of the 'sixties, such as the illustrated London News, and, to about 1876, the publications of the Religious Tract Society: he illustrated also The Indian Nabob of 100 years ago, by G. E. Sargent in The Leisure Hour for 1858, a story of considerable merit of the British conquest and settlement of Bengal: he painted a series of dissolving views of Indian life, exhibited in London before 1862: his signature on drawings is usually J.B. but occasionally J.A.B.