The New International Encyclopædia/Ritter, Henry

RITTER, Henry (1816–53). A Canadian genre painter, born at Montreal. He studied under Gröger in Hamburg and under Karl Ferdinand Sohn at Düsseldorf. Among his chararteristic and finely colored episodes from the life of sailors and fishermen, showing the influence of Rudolf Jordan, the most prominent are: “Braggart in Sailor's Tavern” (1841); “Offer of Marriage in Normandy” (1842, Leipzig Museum); “Drowned Son of the Pilot” (1844, Ravené Gallery, Berlin); “Poacher Before Justice of the Peace” (1847), his largest painting; “Prairie Fire” (1851, Kunsthalle, Hamburg); “The Son's Last Letter” (1852, Kunsthalle, Bremen); and “Middy's Sermon” (1853, Cologne Museum).