Richard Eurich

He was the second of five children born to Dr Friederich Wilhelm Eurich, a professor of forensic medicine and a bacteriologist known for his research into the disease anthrax.

Eurich spent the early part of the 1930s living in small fishing ports on the south coast of England and in 1934 he settled in Hythe, Hampshire.

His panoramic painting of the Dunkirk beaches made his name overnight when it was shown at the National Gallery in August 1940, alongside Cundall's treatment of the same subject.

[4] Some of these works were based on locations and vessels Eurich was familiar with, such as his paintings of British fishing boats and of naval actions off the south coast of England.

[2] This last category included Survivors From a Torpedoed Ship showing exhausted men clinging to the upturned hull of their lifeboat.

[5] Although the painting was greatly praised, by Winston Churchill among others, WAAC quickly withdrew it from public display fearing it would adversely affect recruitment to the Merchant Navy.

[2][6] During the war, Eurich also painted scenes representing the D-Day landings, the Battle of Salerno, the wreck of the Tirpitz and air attacks on a convoy.

The Esso Oil Refinery at Fawley in Hampshire was close to where he lived and in 1960 he painted a picture of "The Seven Sisters", the name given to a group of pressurised spheres.

[citation needed] In 1958 Eurich wrote an as yet unpublished autobiographical fragment called "As the Twig is Bent" which records his early life until the end of his student days.

[citation needed] In 1991 the Imperial War Museum, assisted by the Fine Art Society, put on a retrospective exhibition which, although he was ill, Eurich managed to attend.

[citation needed] In 1934 Eurich married Mavis Pope, a teacher at Southlands Training College in Wimbledon and the daughter of a Methodist minister.

[citation needed] Eurich was greatly influenced by Sidney Schiff, who wrote under the name Stephen Hudson, and many of his letters to him are in the Tate Archive.