The Bradshaw-Bewick Collection contains works by and relating to the engraver Thomas Bewick (1753-1828). Bewick was born at Cherryburn, near Mickley, Northumberland and his early interest in drawing, under the tuition of the Reverend C. Gregson, was later developed when he was apprenticed under the Newcastle engraver, Ralph Beilby. He was to become a master craftsman.Bewick had a particular fascination with the natural world and this is reflected in works such as A general history of quadrupeds (1790) and History of British birds (1797). The collection is strong in Bewick's other main area of interest - morals and fables. His Select fables (1784) was immediately popular and ran into several editions but he worked on many small moral instruction books, such as Youth's instructive and entertaining story-teller (1778) and The looking-glass for the mind (1792).