A Wounded Buffalo Overthrowing a Hunter in Pursuit

Generously provided by National Museum of Wildlife Art

This is the first version of a rather popular, dramatic scene that Miller recalled from his travels with Stewart. It was drawn specifically for Stewart to be bound into a portfolio for his Murthly Castle library. Unlike later pictorial interpretations of the life-threatening action, Stewart is pictured as saving his fellow hunter. The hunter was Pierre, one of the captain’s favorite companions. Pierre was an impetuous young man who loved to hunt buffalo and loved even more to taunt them after they were wounded. It was a perverse and reckless habit that cost him this famous tumble and, a few years later on, his life.

Peter H. Hassrick

Object Information
Provenance

Artist

Alfred Jacob Miller

Date

ca. 1837

Catalogue Number

293

Medium

Watercolor and ink wash on paper

Inscriptions

UR: 32. UC: A Wounded Buffalo Overthrowing a Hunter in Pursuit

Dimensions: 6 15/16 x 10 (17.6 x 25.4 cm)
Accession Number: M1990.041
Subjects: Pierre, William Drummond Stewart

The artist; Sir William Drummond Stewart (ca. 1839); Frank Nichols; [Chapman’s, Edinburgh, 1871]; Bonamy Mansell Power; willed to Edward Power (1900); by descent to Major G.H. Power, Great Yarmouth, England; [Parke-Bernet Galleries, Inc, New York, NY, 1966]; [?]; present owner

A Wounded Buffalo Overthrowing a Hunter in Pursuit

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