Biography courtesy of Who Was Who in American Art, the reference book on the cultural life in the United States.

Birth place:  Drygrange, Roxboroughshire, Scotland

Death place: Watkins Glen, NY

Addresses: Watkins Glen, NY, 1872

Profession: Portrait, historical, and landscape painter

Studied: self-taught

Exhibited: Am. Art Union, 1848; NAD, 1854-82; Brooklyn AA, 1862-76; PAFA, 1876

Member: ANA, 1871

Work: CGA, Wash., DC; Shelburne (VT) Mus.; Tennessee State Mus.

Comments: Brought to Canada as a child. He was apprenticed to a wagon-maker at Fairhaven (VT) and attended Castleton (VT) Seminary for a year, after which he took up portrait painting in West Rutland (VT) in 1843. From 1844-46 he painted portraits in Montreal. He then returned to Castleton, taught at the Seminary, and began to paint and exhibit landscapes. He saw active service during the Civil War and made many studies which he later developed into a series of large battle paintings and exhibited throughout the country after the war. After 1872 Hope made his home at Watkins Glen (NY) where he continued to paint landscapes. On February 18, 2000, over 30 of his oil paintings where offered at Mapes Auctioneers & Appraisers, Vestal, NY. The paintings had been discovered in the estate of his great-granddaughter in Watkins Glen, NY.

Sources: G&W; Karolik Cat., 357-365; Hemenway, Historical Gazetteer, III, 532; CAB; Cowdrey, NAD; Cowdrey, AA & AAU; Rutledge, PA; NYBD 1858; New England BD 1860; Portfolio (Dec. 1951), 86-87. More recently, see Muller, Paintings and Drawings at the Shelburne, 81 (w/repro.); Kelly, Landscape and Genre Painting in Tennessee, 1810-1985," 62-63 (w/repro.); Falk, Exh. Record Series.