A BEAUTIFUL girl, flowers in her lap, sits in silent thought beside the River Derwent that will later claim her life.

The scene, from a story in William Woods's 17th Century Tales and Traditions of the Peak, was captured by County Durham artist Henry Hetherington Emmerson in the 1850s.

Now the poignant painting, exhibited at the Royal Academy in London in 1857, is to be sold at auction for the first time after surfacing from a private collection.

The 16in by 20in canvas is expected to fetch anywhere between £15,000 and £25,000 when it goes under the hammer at Sotheby's in London on May 20.

According to Woods's story, Anne Moreton, afterwards known as The Maid of Derwent, was wooed by the "wild and wayward" Bernard Wells, of Hazelford.

His father was furious and insisted that the relationship be terminated. They eloped one rainy night, but halfway across the ford over the Derwent, Wells lost his footing and they both plunged into the water. Wells survived but Anne perished.

Emmerson was an ancestor of the internationally know muralist Neil Estu, and captured the scene as the barefooted-girl sits beside the swirling waters where she will die.

The artist, who was born in 1831 and died in 1895, studied with William Bell Scott, in Newcastle, and the detailed work shows the influence of the pre-Raphaelites.

Although extremely talented, Emmerson is a peripheral figure in the world of leading Victorian pre-Raphaelite painters.