(?1691 - 1758) of Shenstone Park, Staffs, e. s. of Samuel Barbour; educ. Eton and St John's Camb. 1707; M.Temple 1708; m. 1722 Ldy. Elizabeth Stanhope, dau. of 3rd E. of Chesterfield; MP 1715 - 22.
- 1712 Naples, Rome (Feb. 1712), Venice (Mar.), Padua (4 Apr.)
1728 - 9 Rome (by Aug. - 18 Nov. 1728), Leghorn, Padua (23 Jan. 1729) [Paris Nov.]
Samuel Hill is said to have travelled on the Continent between c.1709 - 1715. He was probably the 'Mr Hill, of the Admiraltie's nephew', 'a very pretty gentleman' who came from Naples to Rome in February 1712 and who lent a house in Naples (which he 'had taken for some time') to Charles Baldwyn.1 He was certainly in Padua on 4 April 17122 and was presumably the Mr Hill in Venice by 18 March.3
Hill was again in Italy in 1728 - 9 when he bought and commissioned a number of (principally Venetian) pictures, and set up the apprenticeship of his nephew Samuel Egerton with Joseph Smith in Venice.4 He was in Rome in 1728 sometime before August (when his sister had received a letter from him there) and he was then in Leghorn, where he intended to try and fix his nephew with a merchant. He was probably the Hill listed in Rome on 18 November 1728,5 and on 23 January 1729 he was in Padua ('per l'ultima volta').6 On 26 November 1729 Joseph Smith in Venice wrote to him at Paris listing those items which Hill had bought and were then being shipped to London; they included '6 Peices of Piazzetta', '1 Rosalba', 'Holy Family by Tizian', 'Peice of old Roman Painting a fresco' and '2 peices Marco Ricci'; Smith also said he had paid 'Magnoni of Bologna' for '2 copys' made for Hill.
Back at Shenstone Park in July 1730 Hill received another letter from Smith saying that 'At last I've got Canal under articles to finish your 2 peices within a twelvemonth'; on 15 December 1730 Samuel Egerton in Venice told his uncle that the two pictures by Canal 'you order'd when you was last here' should shortly be ready.
1. Baldwyn Letters, 372 - 3. 2. Commons 1, 2:138. Brown 1406. 3. SP 99/59, f.361 (Cole, 18 Mar. 1712). 4. See Chaloner 1950, 160 - 4. 5. SP 85/16 (Walton, 18 Nov. 1728). 6. Brown 1865.