Portrait of Offspring Blackhall D.D, Bishop of Exeter, 1709.

A portrait of Offspring Blackhall D. D., (1655-1716), Bishop of Exeter, 1709, "presented to the Episcopal Charity Girls' School on St Andrew's Day 1954 by the Right Reverend Robert Cecil Mortimer, D.D, Bishop of Exeter." Framed.

A framed simple black and white bust-length portrait of a white middle-aged man with long grey hair to his shoulders. He wears a white shirt with plain black vestments over his shoulders, against a plain black background. Italic scroll beneath reads ‘Portrait of Offspring Blackhall D.D., Bishop of Exeter, 1709 presented to the Episcopal Charity Girls’ School on St. Andrew’s Day 1954 by the Right Reverend Robert Cecil Mortimer. D.D., Bishop of Exeter.'

Offspring Blackhall (or Blackall), 1655-1716, was nominated for the role of Bishop of Exeter by Queen Anne, earning the nickname the ‘queen’s bishop’, and was consecrated in 1708. He also held the deanery of St. Buryan in Cornwall and the rectory of Shobrooke in Devon. He was known for his religious controversies, publishing sermons against John Toland and Benjamin Hoadly amongst others, and was attacked for his views throughout his clerical career. In 1709, he founded four charitable schools in Exeter through the Episcopal Charity Trust. Each school had 40 pupils, and both institutions still exist to this day. These schools were divided, one for boys and one for girls, in which the boys were taught to read and write, and the girls to knit and sew. The schools saw many changes in location and name over the years, at one point becoming 'Bishop Blackall’s School for Girls' in his honour, with 530 girls enrolled by the end
of the 1950s (presumably the reason why the portrait was gifted to the school as detailed in the script). The school has since merged as St Peter’s Church of England High School. Many of Blackall’s sermons and works can be found in the heritage DEI collections and at the University of Exeter, including Blackall’s Works (A.50.5-6) in which the preface by his friend William Dawes details his death in 1716, having fallen from a horse and developing gangrene from his injuries. He was buried at Exeter Cathedral with no grave marker or monument in accordance with his will.

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