There is a closer connection between artist Francis Bacon and Huddersfield than his painting gifted to the council and worth millions of pounds.

His ‘Figure Study 2’ has recently been at the centre of a controversial debate over whether Kirklees should sell it to ease its financial woes – but it won’t be sold.

The painting was gifted to Batley Art Gallery in the 1950s and art experts now believe could be worth up to £60 million.

Examiner reader John Ward, a former art student at Huddersfield School of Art, said: “I was born and bred in Huddersfield and as a teenager I discovered that Francis Bacon was my distant cousin. When I was an art student Bacon’s art was not highly regarded and unfortunately he was better known for his lifestyle and his ‘criminal’ sexual behaviour than for his paintings.

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“Francis Bacon was a two times great grandson of Thomas Firth, the head of Thomas Firth & Sons, the Steelmakers of Sheffield. Thomas Firth himself married a lady by the name of Mary Loxley and many of the Firth descendants carry the middle name of Loxley. Mary was a direct descendant of Thomas de Locksley, bailiff of the Bradfield Manor in 1340, this is the ancient Loxley family of Hallamshire that claim descent from an earl of Huntingdon and also count Robin Hood as one of theirs should you care to believe the legend started by Sir Walter Scott.

“My mother’s family were named Howson and several were stonemasons in Tickhill, Yorkshire. My three times great grandfather James Howson (1818-1883) moved from Tickhill to Ecclesfield in 1841 where he met and married a Sarah Loxley (1821-1878), also a direct descendant of Thomas de Locksley.

Francis Bacon Figure Study 2 at Huddersfield Art Gallery.

“The Howsons lived for many years in Chapeltown, near Ecclesfield, before a number of them moved to Huddersfield. My grandmother Elsie Howson (1892-1978) settled in Brow Road, Paddock, and her siblings Nellie and Hettie also moved to Huddersfield. Elsie married a master slater William Henry Price (1883-1971) from Sheffield whose family had also moved to Huddersfield. William and Elsie had six children including my mother Olive May Price (1917-2001) who married in 1940 Edward George Ward (1912-1984), from Alton, Hampshire.

“This was a strange coincidence as years later it was discovered that E G Ward’s great grandfather, John (Jas) Beaumont (1775-1861) was born in Milnsbridge, Huddersfield, and fought with the ‘The 33rd Foot, 1st West Yorkshire Regiment’ at Waterloo in 1815. Numerous members of those Howson, Price (Helm, Hirst, Stringer, Allan, Clarkson), Daws, Ainley (Falkingham, Semenowicz) and Ward (Hawkins) families are still resident in Huddersfield today. As you may deduce, numerous Huddersfield relations of Francis Bacon.”