Departures of note

On 28 January 1805 William Tassie won the Boydell Shakespeare Gallery and its painting collection in a lottery held to pay off the debts of its owner John Boydell. Tassie's three‑guinea ticket was the top prize among the 22,000 tickets sold, and Boydell had died just before the drawing.

Josiah Boydell, John Boydell's nephew, offered to buy the gallery and its paintings back from William Tassie for £10,000, but Tassie refused and auctioned the paintings at Christie's, where the collection and two reliefs by Anne Damer fetched £6,181 18s. 6d.