Rose Emma Drummond (c. 1790âÂÂ1840) was a British portrait miniaturist who is known for her works of theatre actresses. She was active between 1815 and 1837. She was also the inspiration for Miss La Creevy in the Charles Dickens novel Nicholas Nickleby.
Drummond's parents were the artistÃÂ Samuel DrummondÃÂ and his first wife. Her half-sisters Ellen Drummond, Eliza Ann Drummond, Jane Drummond and Rosa Myra Drummond and her half brothers Julian Drummond and Philip Maurice Drummond, from her father's second and third marriages, all also became artists.
Drummond is most known for her portrait miniature work and painting theatre actresses, with her famous sitters includingÃÂ Elizabeth Walker Blanchard,ÃÂ Louisa Chatterley,ÃÂ Clara Fisher,ÃÂ Elizabeth Inchbald,ÃÂ Henrietta Mangeon, Jane Pope,ÃÂ Harriet Smithson, Mary Tighe, Ellen Tree, Emma Wensley and Anne Wignell. Her sitters were sometimes dressed as their characters. She also painted Hannah Thatcher, who was "a young lady born deaf and dumb who was presented to Her late Majesty on acquiring the faculty of speech, and the sense of hearing".
Drummond was an Associate of theÃÂ Royal Academy of ArtsÃÂ and exhibited there throughout her career. Drummond also exhibited at theÃÂ New Water-Colour SocietyÃÂ between 1831 and 1835.
Drummond is also considered the inspiration for the character Miss La Creevy, the middle-aged miniature painter in the 1838 novelÃÂ Nicholas NicklebyÃÂ byÃÂ Charles Dickens. In 1835 she had painted his likeness on ivory as an engagement present from him toÃÂ Catherine Hogarth, with "Painted by Rose Emma Drummond, 8 Soho Square, 9th July 1835" engraved on the back. Drummond was portrayed byÃÂ Nora NicholsonÃÂ in the 1970 BBC 2 filmÃÂ The Great Inimitable Mr Dickens.
Drummond emigrated to Mexico in the late 1830s to live with her younger brother Samuel Drummond. She died in Mexico City in 1840.