William Derby

In 1808 he moved to London, where he began his career by making the reduced drawings for the plates of the Stafford Gallery,[1] a set of engravings of the paintings in the Marquess of Stafford's collection, published in four volumes in 1818 with text by William Young Ottley and Peltro William Tomkins.

[1] In 1838 a severe attack of paralysis deprived him of speech and the use of one side of his body, but in a few months he had recovered sufficiently to continue his work, which he did with the assistance of his son, Alfred Thomas Derby.

The copy is also a gem: the elegance of the drawing, the deep sentiment of the work, and the various textures and local colours, are given with a fidelity and beauty truly astonishing.

[3] Hollins added:It has been a great advantage to the world of art, when fine original pictures have been inaccessible to the engraver, to have copies made by an artist of the powers possessed by Mr. Derby, who, while he attended with the greatest care to the most minute accessories, caught the spirit and character of each particular master he undertook to imitate.

[3] He was buried in a family grave close to the upper entrance of the western side of Highgate Cemetery.