James Northcote, R.A. (Plymouth 1746-1831 London)

Richard Baylay, son of Timothy Baylay, of Stoke Damerall, near Plymouth, and Elizabeth Trenizon, was born in 1742, and is known to have been employed at Plymouth Docks, now known as Devonport, by 1760. He was a successful business man and had property in Stoke Damerall and Meavy. He married Mary (lot 51), a daughter of William and Arminel Foster of Plymouth, in 1776, by whom he had two sons and three daughters. The eldest son, Henry Mervyn, inherited his father's estates which he sold and afterwards retired to Guernsey to marry a Miss Le Patourel. The other, William Frederick, spent his 50,000 portion and went into the church. Northcote painted three other family portraits for Richard Baylay in 1782 at a cost of eight guineas each, and in 1797, a portrait of his youngest daughter, Harriet Foster, with a hen and chickens.