Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Jones, Charlotte
JONES, CHARLOTTE (1768–1847), miniature portrait-painter, was born in 1768. She was one of a family who migrated from Wales into Norfolk about 1680, and settled near the north coast of that county. On the death of her father, Thomas Jones of Cley, she moved to London, where she adopted miniature-painting as a profession. She was a pupil of Richard Cosway [q. v.], and her portraits are noted for a somewhat richer colouring than was then usual. She exhibited at the Royal Academy rooms in Somerset House from 1801 to 1823 inclusive, but some of her best miniatures, as those of the Prince Regent, Lady Caroline Lamb, and eight of the Princess Charlotte, were not shown. A portrait of Prince William of Gloucester was the first that appeared at the Royal Academy exhibitions, and it was followed by forty examples of her paintings during the twenty-two years she practised her art. In 1808, by the sanction of Queen Charlotte and the Prince Regent, she was appointed ‘miniature-painter to the Princess Charlotte of Wales,’ and she is chiefly known by the series of miniatures of that princess, executed from the life, which illustrate each successive period of her history, from infancy to marriage. These portraits, twelve in number, Charlotte Jones called ‘The Princess Charlotte from her cradle to her grave,’ and collected them into a triptych case, where they are still preserved at Cranmer Hall, Norfolk, the seat of Sir Lawrence Jones, bart.
Charlotte Jones survived for many years the favourite subject of her pencil. She suffered in her later years from a partial loss of eyesight, and died in Upper Gloucester Place, London, on 21 Sept. 1847, in her eightieth year.
[An account of Charlotte Jones is given in the Princess Charlotte of Wales, a monograph, by the present writer, 1885.]