Rediscovering Bertha T. Buckley: the woman who shaped the V&A’s Glass Collection

The Wilfred Buckley collection at the V&A comprises over 600 pieces, with more than 500 currently displayed in the glass galleries in Room 131. Encyclopaedic in scope, the collection features numerous signed pieces by Dutch and English artists, Venetian, French, and German enamelled glass from the 16th and 17th centuries, alongside Roman, Islamic, and Chinese glass. Bernard Rackham, Keeper of the Department of Glass and Ceramics at the V&A in the 1930s, described it as ‘the best private collection of glass vessels’ he had ever encountered. In 1936, the collection was generously donated to the museum by Mrs. Bertha T. Buckley in memory of her late husband.

 While the collection now bears the name of the esteemed collector and connoisseur Wilfred Buckley (1873 – 1933), a testament to his dedication to preserving the finest examples of decorative arts, this recognition has often overshadowed Bertha’s significant contributions. Wilfred himself referred to it as ‘The Collection of Mr. and Mrs. Wilfred Buckley’ and in the preface to The Art of Glass: The Wilfred Buckley Collection in the Victoria and Albert Museum (1939), he described it as ‘the collection that my wife and I have made’. Yet, since the collection’s arrival at the museum, Bertha’s efforts in collecting, cataloguing, managing, and researching these objects have largely been overlooked. Archival records at the V&A provide an opportunity to reevaluate the collection and rediscover Bertha’s scholarly and connoisseurial achievements.

Bertha’s correspondence with Rackham reveals the depth of her involvement in loaning and ultimately donating the collection to the museum after Wilfred’s death. A letter from May 1936 confirms her decision to gift the collection to the museum after months of discussion:

I hereby give the undermentioned objects to the Board of Education for inclusion in the Collection of the Victoria and Albert Museum, such gift to ensure for the benefit of the Nation and to be under the care of the ordering board.  Bertha T. Buckley

Although during his lifetime Wilfred had expressed a preference for the collection  to be donated only through his daughter’s will, keeping it as financial security, Bertha’s decision to gift it sooner demonstrated her commitment to preserving the collection and ensuring its public accessibility.

Bertha was instrumental not only in the administrative transition of the collection from Moundsmere Manor to the V&A but also in preparing the collection catalogue and conducting extensive research on the objects. She provided curators with detailed information on provenance, expanded her expertise through discussions with museum staff about various glass-making techniques, and corresponded with prominent dealers and scholars such as Cecil Davis and Arthur Upham Pope. On occasion, she even challenged the museum curators’ judgments on object classifications, as seen in a letter:

It concerns No. 39, which in your list follows No. 28 as V&A No. 277. I found your note in the album saying that this cup and cover are “painted in unfired colours” (i.e. with painted glass, not fired after decoration). I am very reluctant to question your placing, but I should, nevertheless, be glad if Mr Rackham and you would review the glass.

Following Wilfred’s death, Bertha undertook the monumental task of completing the catalogue that her husband had begun and complemented other publications, such as D. Wolff and the Glasses that he Engraved (1935). Her meticulous notes can be found throughout these works, particularly on a collection of beads and fragments (C.698 to C.712) excavated at Tel-el-Amarna by the Egyptian Exploration Society and dating to the reign of Amenhotep IV.

She also provided provenance details and descriptions to finalise the monograph on D. Wolff’s engraved glasses, as more exemples have been discovered and attributed to the Duch engraver since Mr. Buckley’s death. Consulting with Rackham, Bertha published notes on the glasses such as:

No. 33. Dated 1755. Height 24.7 cm. on one side two half-length figures, of a semi-nude young woman and an old man. On the reverse in script is “F. Greenwood Fecit. A. 1755. Etat. 75” (Plate 25).
Baron Cornelius von Heyl zu Herrnsheim Collection.
– BERTHA T. BUCKLEY.”

Wilfred frequently credited Bertha for her assistance in researching and describing glasses, suggesting that many of his publications were collaborative efforts. In addition, several pieces (including C.86 to C.89-1936) were added to the collection after Mr. Buckley’s death, underscoring Bertha’s commitment to expanding and maintaining it.

There are only some examples of contributions Bertha T. Buckley made to the collection. Her story is a testament to the often overlooked work of women in the arts and challenges us to reconsider how we research and remember their contributions. Such considerations may lead us to think more about the other three women mentioned in the collection records: Mrs. Smith who completed the catalogue after Mrs. Buckley’s death, Adeleide Weissel who is referenced as dealer of a hanging lamp (C.252-1936) and the prominent Dutch artist Anna Roemers Visscher credited with engraving a roemer of delicate green tint (C.287-1936).

Bertha Buckley’s story exemplifies the challenges faced by female collectors and scholars in the early 20^th century. Despite these challenges, her legacy endures through the collection and the catalogues as testament of her work. This new perspective on the Buckley Collection thus allows a more well-rounded idea of the development of the collection and the dynamics of gendered labour conventions.