Benjamin Robert Haydon was born at Plymouth on 26 January 1786. His father was a stationer and publisher. Haydon was an only son and showed early promise, which was fostered by his mother. At the age of six, he was placed in Plymouth Grammar School, and at twelve, in Plympton St Mary School. On the ceiling of the school-room was a sketch by Joshua Reynolds in burnt cork, which Haydon loved. He considered entering the medical profession, but was so shocked by witnessing an operation, that he gave up the idea. Full of promise, he left home for London in May 1804 and entered the RA Schools. Such was his appetite for hard work, Henry Fuseli asked when he ever found time to eat. Aged 21, Haydon exhibited The Repose in Egypt at the RA. Shortly after, he received a commission from Lord Mulgrave and got an introduction to Sir George Beaumont. In 1809 he finished his Dentatus, which, though it increased his fame, resulted in a lifelong quarrel with the RA, the committee having hung it in a side-room, instead of the Great Hall. That same year, he took on his first pupil, Charles Lock Eastlake, later destined to become one of the greats of the art establishment. In 1810 Haydon’s financial difficulties began, when the allowance of £200 a year from his father was stopped. He became embroiled in controversies with Beaumont and the connoisseur Richard Payne Knight, who denied the beauty, as well as the monetary value of the Elgin Marbles. The Judgment of Solomon, his next production, gained him £700, besides £100 voted to him by the directors of the British Institution, and the freedom of the Borough of Plymouth. To restore his health and escape for a time from the cares of London life, Haydon joined his friend David Wilkie in a trip to Paris; he studied at the Louvre; and upon returning to England, produced Christ’s Entry into Jerusalem, which afterwards formed the nucleus of the American Gallery of Painting, erected by his cousin, John Haviland of Philadelphia. The architect Sir John Soane has bequeathed something of a reputation as a skinflint to posterity, but Haydon’s diaries tell a rather different story. In June 1815 he recorded: ‘Last November Soane said, ‘You owe me £15. Suppose I make it fifty!’ Really the benevolence I have met with, I believe unexampled, as well as the malevolence.’ Whilst painting The Resurrection of Lazarus Haydon was arrested for debt, but not imprisoned, the sheriff taking his word for his appearance. Yet in October, 1821, he married a beautiful young widow with children, Mrs Hyman, to whom he was devoted.  In 1823 Haydon was imprisoned in the King’s Bench Prison, where he received consoling letters from leading men of the day. Whilst there, he drew up a petition to Parliament in favour of the appointment of ‘a committee to inquire into the state of encouragement of historical painting’, which was presented by Lord Brougham. During Haydon’s second imprisonment in 1827, he produced the picture The Mock Election and King George IV gave him £500 for it. In 1834 he completed The Reform Banquet, for Lord Grey – the painting contained 597 portraits; in 1843, Curtius Leaping into the Gulf, and Uriel and Satan. He also produced his The Meeting of the Anti-Slavery Society, now in the National Portrait Gallery. When the competition took place at Westminster Hall, Haydon sent two cartoons, The Curse of Adam and Edward the Black Prince, but gained nothing for either. He then painted The Banishment of Aristides, which was exhibited under the same roof where the American dwarf General Tom Thumb was making his London debut. The exhibition was unsuccessful; and his difficulties increased to such a degree that, whilst employed on his last grand effort, Alfred and the Trial by Jury, overcome by debt, disappointment and ingratitude, he wrote ‘Stretch me no longer on this rough world’ and shot himself. He left a widow and three children, who were rescued from poverty and provided for by his friends Sir Robert Peel, the Count d’Orsay, Mr Justice Talfourd and Lord Carlisle. Haydon lectured on painting and design, and, from 1835 onwards visited all the principal towns in England and Scotland on lecture tours. His ambition was to see the chief buildings of Britain adorned with history paintings representing her glory. He lived to see the establishment of schools of design, and the embellishment of the new Houses of Parliament; but in the competition of artists for the carrying out of this object, the commissioners (including one of his former pupils) considered that he had failed. Haydon’s Lectures, which were published, demonstrate that he was as bold a writer as painter. His love for his art was both a passion and a principle. In 1977 the comedic actor Leonard Rossiter played Haydon in a West End play written by satirist John Wells titled The Immortal Haydon. It was held to be one of Rossiter’s greatest ever roles.