The New Terrace Walk, York, 1733-56, by Nathan Drake

The New Terrace Walk, York, 1733-56. Painting by Nathan Drake (1727-1778)

York has long been a centre for leisure and entertainment. It was where 18th-century nobility and gentry maintained fashionable town houses and came to enjoy themselves.

However, York lacked places for public promenade: the sociable custom of walking and meeting. Lord Harley visited in 1725 and explained the habit of walking in the Minster ‘for want of a convenience of a park or gardens’. So in 1730 the city corporation decided to construct a tree-lined riverside walk alongside St George’s Field running from the city walls to the mouth of the Foss.

Sixty-six limes and sixty-four elms were planted in 1731 and 1732 to line the walk. Initially the fashionable walk was 480 yards long but such was its popularity that it was extended southwards another three-quarters of a mile beyond the Foss, which was crossed by a wooden drawbridge constructed in 1738. In 1740 an extra 340 elms were purchased to complete the walk.

The York Courant in 1754 commented: “This Terrace Walk made on the banks of the River Ouse and nearly a mile long may be justly esteemed one of the most agreeable publick walks in the Kingdom for its great neatness, beautiful town and situation which is so advantageously seen in its prospect as to render it not unlike nor inferior to any views in Venice.”

This painting by York artist Nathan Drake (1727-1778) shows the ‘noble Terras Walk’ from a spot near its centre ‘for the advantage of seeing the fine Bridge and Cathedral in the view’. Viewing the River Ouse from the South, we see the tree-lined Terrace Walk with elegant ladies and gentlemen taking a stroll in the foreground as the stretch quickly became, as intended, a fashionable promenade. The people shown promenading may have been identifiable characters in York and are said to include Peregrine Wentworth, a York banker, and daughters of Lord Fauconberg.

We can see the wooden bridge that crossed the Foss and the castle wall at the rear of the Debtors Prison, now York Castle Museum. Although the walk led nowhere, there were impressive views of the city to be enjoyed on the return walk and landmarks include the old Ouse Bridge, St. William’s Chapel and the Minster in the distance.

York Museums Trust owns two versions of the painting, one of which hangs in the Mansion House. The composition appears to derive from some engraved plates in Francis Drake’s Eboracum, the history of York published in 1736. By January 29,1754, Drake was advertising the proposed publication by subscription of a print after his view of York from the New Terrace Walk. An engraving of Drake’s ‘Noble Terras Walk’ was made by Charles Grignion, and published on May 16, 1756.

Nathan Drake was a painter and miniaturist. He was probably born in Lincoln, the son of a minor canon. By 1752 he was living in York where he advertised in the York Courant as a ‘Limner and Landscape Painter’ and also as a drawing-master - although he seems to have derived his main income from teaching and cleaning pictures.

His earliest known work is a north-west view of Gainsborough which was engraved by George Vertue in 1747. Drake’s surviving works include portraits, two of which can be seen in Ripon Town Hall. York Art Gallery has another of his portraits painted in 1771 of Francis Drake, the author of Eboracum and probably his cousin.

In 1763 Drake married and moved his painting room from Colliergate to Precentor’s Court where he remained for the rest of his life. In 1771 he was elected a Fellow of the Society of Artists. He died on February 19, 1778 and was buried in the church of St Michael-le-Belfry.

York residents still enjoy this walk and City of York Council has been looking to invest again in an enjoyable walking route by improving St. George’s Field and extending the route northwards along the Foss and into the city. Residents now though want to whiz along on two wheels as well as promenade. I’m not sure our cycling clothes are as elegant...