(c.1718 - 74), s. and h. of Alexander Andrews of Co. Antrim; Trin. Dublin 1733, fell. 1740 and provost 1758 - 74; MP [I] 1759 - 60, 1761 - 74.
1766 - 7 Bologna (Nov. 1766), Turin (Oct.), Rome (Nov.), Naples (Dec. 1766 - Jan. 1767), Rome (Mar. - Apr.), Venice (May), Padua (Jun.)
Francis Andrews had travelled with Richard Rigby in 1764, passing through Paris on his way south in August.1 In September 1766 he again set out from Paris, hoping to reach Turin early in October.2 Lady Holland met him in Bologna, where he was complaining that 'in the midst of vineyards he can't get a good glass of wine'.3 By November he was in Rome 'charmed with his expedition'. Lord Kildare saw him in Naples in December - January 1766 - 7,4 but he was back in Rome by March, when he told his friend Robert Fitzgerald that his [Andrews's] 'bust is finished and extremely like ... I shall leave this city on Easter Monday, and the intermediate time between that and the Ascension I shall spend in visiting Tuscany, and then set out for Venice'.2 According to Kildare 'and many gentlemen who lived much with him at Rome', Andrews displayed considerable talent in Italy where he 'charmed, and almost astonished the learned professors of Padua, by his classical attainments, and the uncommon quickness, purity, and ease, with which he addressed, and replied to them in the latin language' and he 'captivated our young men of rank then resident in Rome'.5
He sat to Anton Maron (Provost's House, Trinity Coll., Dublin), probably in 1767 when he wrote to Fitzgerald from Rome in March 'But why ask for my portrait? I would rather carry a chair in the dog-days [than] sit. And yet I believe you must have it. I accept yours with great thanks'. Maron had painted Fitzgerald in 1765. Also in the Provost's House are busts of Commodus and Caracalla and the 4th Duke of Bedford, and Hewetson's bust of Rigby, all probably among the busts left to the College by Andrews.6 In 1768 Sir James Wright in Venice had 'several cases of Pictures &c belonging to Andrews',7 amongst which were probably the Piranesis and books on Italian antiquities which Andrews bequeathed to his friend Rigby. To judge from his greatest monument, the Provost's House, Andrews was a well-connected and extravagant patron of conservative taste.
1. Wal.Corr., 38:427. 2. Itinerary from his letters to Robt.Fitzgerald, Kt. of Kerry; PRO NI t3075 (see M.A. Hickson, Selections from Old Kerry Records, 2nd ser. [1874]). 3. Leinster
Corr., 1:478. 4. Ibid., 3:448 - 50, 465, 502. 5. F. Hardy, Memoirs of James Caulfield, Earl of Charlemont, [1810]. 6. His will is Trin. Dublin, MSS Board Reg.1740 - 83, mun v/5/3, pp.287 - 90. 7. NLI MS 255 (Jn. Dawson, 8 Jun. 1768).
E. McP.