Henry Justice Ford

Self Portrait of Henry Justice Ford

Henry Justice Ford (1860–1941) was a prolific and successful English artist and illustrator, active from 1886 through to the late 1920s. Sometimes known as H. J. Ford or Henry J. Ford, he came to public attention when he provided the numerous beautiful illustrations for Andrew Lang's Fairy Books, which captured the imagination of a generation of British children and were sold worldwide in the 1880s and 1890s.

Early years

After education at Repton School and Clare College, Cambridge - where he gained a first class in the Classical Tripos in 1882 - Ford returned to London to study at the Slade School of Fine Art and later, at the Bushey School of Art, under the German-born Hubert von Herkomer.

Career

In 1892, Ford began exhibiting paintings of historical subjects and landscapes at the Royal Academy of Art exhibitions. However it was his illustrations for such books as The Arabian Nights Entertainments (Longmans 1898), Kenilworth (TC & EC Jack 1900), and A School History of England by C. R. L. Fletcher and Rudyard Kipling (Clarendon Press 1911) that provided Ford with both income and fame.

Family

Richard John Cuninghame (1871–1925)

His parents were Katherine Mary Justice and William Augustus Ford; his paternal grandfather was George Samuel Ford, a well known bill discounter. His father (a solicitor by profession) and many of his family were cricketers. His father wrote a number of articles and books on the subject, and Ford's brother, Francis Ford (1866-1940), played for England in an Ashes series in Australia.

At the age of 61, Ford surprised his friends by marrying a woman some thirty-five years younger. She was Emily Amelia Hoff (née Rose), a widow whose first husband had been killed in the Battle of Neuve Chapelle in March 1915. Following the marriage in Kensington Register Office in February 1921, Henry and Emily Ford settled down in Bedford Gardens, Kensington for several years and, in 1927, the couple adopted a child, June Mary Magdelene Ford. The seated model in Henry Justice Ford's painting 'Remembering Happier Things', now in the collection of the Russell-Cotes Art Gallery, Bournemouth, bears a strong resemblance to Ford's wife, Emily.

Hobbies

His love of the game led Henry Justice Ford to play cricket regularly with the playwright JM Barrie's Allahakbarrie Cricket Club. This in turn led to Ford providing the well-known map of Kensington Gardens in Barrie's 'The Little White Bird.' He also designed the costume for the character of Peter Pan when Barrie's play was staged in the West End for the first time in 1904. Ford's wide-ranging interests brought him into contact and friendship with many well-known figures of his time, including the writers PG Wodehouse, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, and AEW Mason.

Gallery

• 
  Allerleirauh. The Green Fairy Book. (1892)
• 
  The Snow Queen takes Kay in her sledge. The Pink Fairy Book. (1897)
• 
  What came of picking jessamine. The Grey Fairy Book. (1900)
• 
  Morgan Casts Away Excalibur's Scabbard. King Arthur: The Tales of the Round Table. (1902)
• 
  Listen listen said the mermaid to the prince. The Brown Fairy Book. (1904)
• 
  The End of the Dragon. The Red Romance Book. (1905)
• 
  How the Fairies came to see Ogier the Dane. The Red Romance Book. (1905)
• 
  Marie Antoinette and Mozart. The Book of Princes and Princesses. (1908)
• 
  Indians. The Strange Story Book. (1913)
• 
  The Chariot of Freya. Tales of Romance. (1919)
• 
  Arthur meets the Lady of the Lake and gets the Sword Excalibur. Tales of Romance. (1919)

Further reading

• Hares-Stryker, Caroline (2009). "Doing Justice to Henry: a biographical study of Henry Justice Ford". Studies in Illustration. 43 (Winter). Imaginative Book Illustration Society.

External links

• Heiner, Heidi Anne (10 October 2007). "SurLaLune Fairy Tales: Illustrations of Henry J. Ford". Archived from the original on 3 May 2020.
• Works by Henry Justice Ford at Project Gutenberg
• Works by Henry Justice Ford (illustrator) at Faded Page (Canada)
• Works by or about Henry Justice Ford at the Internet Archive
• Works by Henry Justice Ford at Toronto Public Library
• H. J. Ford at Library of Congress, with 38 library catalogue records