What happened here that made the French surrender? The great British art quiz

The Surrender of the French at Fishguard, 1797, unknown artist. Photograph: Carmarthenshire Museums Service Collection

This quiz is brought to you in collaboration with Art UK, the online home for the UK’s public art collections, showing art from more than 3,000 venues and by 45,000 artists. Each day, a different collection on Art UK will set the questions.

Today, our questions are set by Amgueddfeydd Sir Gâr/Carmarthenshire Museums, in south-west Wales. The collections span 50,000 years of history and reflect the county’s varied past. The art collection is a good mix of local and Welsh subjects and artists, and contains some surprises. View art from the museums on Art UK here. Find out more on the Amgueddfeydd Sir Gâr/Carmarthenshire Museums website here.

1. 

   Art UK helped uncover the identity of this unknown soldier and reveal a tragic family tale. Who was the artist?

   1. James Evans

   2. Mary Girardot

   3. Paul Girardot

   4. Mary Evans

2. 

   This oil painting of Furnace Quarry is very different to James Dickson Innes’s later distinctive naive style. With which famous Welsh artist did Innes visit and paint in Snowdonia in 1911?

   1. Christopher Williams

   2. Augustus John

   3. Gwen John

   4. Kyffin Williams

3. 

   Thanks to the TV show Britain's Lost Masterpieces, this portrait is now believed to have been painted by which artist?

   1. Sir Peter Lely

   2. Willem Wissing

   3. Mary Beard

   4. Mary Beale

4. 

   Who is reported to have saved the day during the 'last invasion of Britain’?

   1. Lord Cawdor

   2. General Picton

   3. Jemima Nicholas

   4. Colonel William Tate

5. 

   What was the role of this artist when he died from malaria in Tunisia in 1943?

   1. Medic

   2. Radio operator

   3. Camouflage artist

   4. Sapper

6. 

   Charlotte Cookman was severely wounded in an attack which saw her father murdered in his library in 1876. Which servant did it?

   1. The Groom

   2. The Cook

   3. The Butler

   4. The Gardener

7. 

   Which of these does not connect this painting with Carmarthenshire Museums Service?

   1. The artist was a member of the Carmarthenshire Antiquarian Society which started Carmarthenshire Museum

   2. A bishop of St Davids founded the building that houses Carmarthenshire Museum today

   3. A bishop relocated the palace from St Davids to what is now Carmarthenshire Museum

   4. The artist lived in Parc Howard before it became a museum

8. 

   Who described Christopher Williams as 'one of the most gifted artists Wales has produced'?

   1. Lloyd George

   2. King George V

   3. Edward, Prince of Wales

   4. Augustus John

Solutions

1:B - The son of army hero Lieutenant-Colonel John Francis Girardot, Paul Charncourt Girardot was killed in France in September 1914. To the museum, his portrait was known simply as ‘the unknown soldier’ but a researcher matched the portrait on ArtUK to a photograph in Paul’s newspaper obituary. His artist mother Mary, once of Carmarthen, had created a portrait of her beloved son from that photograph. There are other examples of her work in the collection. Image: Second Lieutenant Paul Chancourt Girardot (1895-1914), 1st Bn OBLI, c1916-18, (attributed to) Mary Jane Girardot (c1863-1933), Carmarthenshire Museums Service Collection, 2:B - James Dickson Innes was born in Llanelli in 1887 and died young in 1914 from tuberculosis. This early oil painting of Furnace Quarry is very different to the beguiling post-impressionist style which he developed later. In 1907 he met Augustus John in London and they became good friends. In 1911 they went to Arenig in Snowdonia, a place where Innes produced some of his most distinctive work. Image: View of Llanelli from the Furnace Quarry, c1906, James Dickson Innes (1887-1914), Carmarthenshire Museums Service Collection, 3:D - In the collection of portraits from the Golden Grove Estate is this one of Frances Vaughan, Countess of Carbery. It was attributed to court painter Sir Peter Lely. Bendor Grosvenor and the Britain's Lost Masterpieces team showed that the real artist was Mary Beale, one of the country’s most successful 17th -century portrait painters. Image: Frances Vaughan, Countess of Carbery (d1650), c1650, (attributed to) Peter Lely (1618-80), Carmarthenshire Museums Service Collection, 4:C - The last invasion of Britain took place in 1797 when a French force led by Irish-American Colonel William Tate landed at Fishguard. It was a sorry affair, the incident over in a few days. The story goes that local women, led by Jemima Nicholas, dressed up in traditional red capes and black hats to confront the invaders. Seen from a distance the French mistook them for regular troops. The force surrendered when Lord Cawdor arrived with the local yeomanry. Image: The Surrender of the French at Fishguard, 1797, unknown artist, Carmarthenshire Museums Service Collection, 5:C - Edward Morland Lewis was born in Carmarthen, the son of the watercolourist and town gasworks manager, Benjamin Archibald Lewis. Influenced by Sickert, under whom he studied, he is best known for his landscape and genre paintings using bold blocks of colour over a warm underpainting. He later served in the war in north Africa as a camouflage artist – where he died of malaria in 1943. Image: Seascape With a Ship and a Jetty (verso), c1930-35, Edward Morland Lewis (1903-43), Carmarthenshire Museums Service Collection, 6:C - Judge John Johnes was killed with his own shotgun at home at Dolaucothi House. Henry Tremble, his butler, carried out the murder because he was angry that the judge had turned down his application to run a local public house. Having failed to shoot the inn’s new landlord, Tremble killed himself. The artist of this work, Frances Ramsay, was the aunt of the artist Kyffin Williams. Image: Charlotte Cookman née Johnes (1825-1911), 1900-06, Frances Louisa Margaret Ramsay (1858-1928), Carmarthenshire Museums Service Collection, 7:D - Carmarthenshire Museum’s home in Abergwili was given life by Bishop Thomas Bek of St Davids after 1282, when he created a college of priests. During the Reformation, Bishop Barlow threw the priests out because he wanted to live close to Carmarthen. Carmarthenshire Antiquarian Society began the museum in 1908. Following a relocation, the museum reopened to the public in 1978 in Abergwili after the county council bought the property. Image: The Palace, St Davids, 1922, Ernest Vale Collier (1859-1932), Carmarthenshire Museums Service Collection, 8:A - A Fabian socialist and a pacifist, Christopher Williams championed the visual arts in Wales and wanted art to be accessible to everyone. Many of his portraits and landscapes have a Welsh connection, unlike this painting of the Alhambra which was probably inspired by a visit to Spain and Morocco in 1914. image: In the Alhambra, c1910-14, Christopher Williams (1873-1934), Carmarthenshire Museums Service Collection

Scores

1. 1 and above.

   Oh dear, could you even find Wales on a map?

2. 2 and above.

   Oh dear, could you even find Wales on a map?

3. 5 and above.

   Not bad but maybe it's time you ventured west of Swansea

4. 4 and above.

   Not bad but maybe it's time you ventured west of Swansea

5. 8 and above.

   Congrats! Someone clearly knows their Llanelli from their Llandovery

6. 7 and above.

   Congrats! Someone clearly knows their Llanelli from their Llandovery

7. 6 and above.

   Congrats! Someone clearly knows their Llanelli from their Llandovery

8. 3 and above.

   Not bad but maybe it's time you ventured west of Swansea

9. 0 and above.

   Oh dear, could you even find Wales on a map?