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Created by Joseph Mallord William Turner (1775–1851), the artist; with Sophia Caroline Booth (née Nollte) (1798–1875) and Daniel John Pound (1820–1894) after 1851 [1] [a]; purchased at auction by J. and W. Vokins, London, at Christie, Manson & Woods, London, March 25, 1865 (lot 201, ‘Squally Weather’), in "Highly important assemblage of water-colour drawings and English pictures" [2][b][c]; purchased by Henry Sanford Bicknell (1818–1880), 1865, Clapham Common [3][d]; purchased at auction by "Johnston" at Christie, Manson & Woods, London, April 7–9, 1881 (lot 460, ‘Squally Weather’), in "The Celebrated Collection of Pictures, Water-Colour Drawings, and Sculpture of Henry Sanford Bicknell, Esq." [e][f]; purchased at auction by Leggatt Bros, Ltd., Piccadilly, at Christie, Manson & Woods, London, December 12, 1898 (lot 137, ‘Squally Weather’), in "Water-colour Drawings and Pictures of T. H. Worrell, Esq., deceased; and pictures and drawings from numerous private sources" [4][g]; purchased by Thos. Agnew & Sons, London, December 13, 1898 [h]; privately purchased by "P. Westmacott," London, possibly Percy Graham Buchanan Westmacott (1830–1917), February 10, 1899 [5][i]; purchased by Thos. Agnew & Sons, London, November 14, 1901 [j]; privately purchased by James Orrock R.I. (1829–1913), London, November 15, 1901 [6][k]; [sale, Christie, Manson & Woods, London, June 4–6, 1904, lot 141 (unsold)] [7][l]; privately purchased by William Hesketh Lever, first Viscount Leverhulme (1851–1925), London, November 27, 1904 [8][m]; purchased at auction by Mollie Higgins Smith (1881–1968) at Anderson Galleries, New York City, New York, United States, February 17–19, 1926 (lot 271, ‘Off the Nore’), in "The art collections of the late Viscount Leverhulme. Part two, Paintings" for unknown party [9][n]; ...acquired by John David Barrett, Jr. (1903–1981), Greenwich, Connecticut, United States [10]; purchased by Paul Mellon (1907–1999), 1978 [o]; by whom given to the Yale Center for British Art, 1978.

Notes:
[1] Martin Butlin and Evelyn Joll believe that the painting was left in the artist’s studio upon his death, unsold. It is not certain where the painting was held in the period after the artist’s death and its purchase at auction in 1865. However, it is known that the anonymous sale of twenty-two works by the artist, advertised in the auction catalogue as "never before been before the Public, and are in a perfectly pure and genuine state," at Christie, Manson & Woods, London, on March 24–25, 1868, derives from the collection of Daniel John Pound (1820–1894), the only surviving son of Turner’s housekeeper and companion Sophia Caroline Booth (née Nollte) (1798–1875).

[2] A newspaper report describes a work titled "Squally Weather" as one of two "powerful studies in oil" offered for sale at the May 24–25, 1865 sale at Christie, Manson & Woods, and purchased by "Vokins." The Vokins family established a reputation as carvers, gilders, and framemakers under the patriarch and founder John Vokins (1788–1832). He brought his two sons, John Henry Vokins (1810/11-78) and William Vokins (1815-95), into the business and they expanded operations to include art dealing.

[3] Henry Sanford Bicknell (1818–1880) was the son and heir of Elhanan Bicknell (1788–1861), a London businessman and arts patron, whose major collection of art included works by Turner and hung at his house in Herne Hill, Surrey. According to an April 1, 1865, issue from The Atheneum, Bicknell is provided as the buyer from the 1865 Christie’s sale. It is possible that Vokins either purchased the painting on behalf of Bicknell or immediately sold it to him.

[4] The auction took place over three days. This painting was sold on the third day, April 9.

[5] A "P. Westmacott, Esq." is listed as the lender of the painting to the exhibition of Turner’s work at Guildhall in 1899. It’s possible that this refers to Percy Graham Buchanan Westmacott (1830–1917), a prominent and wealthy English engineer and art collector, as well as the nephew of Sir Richard Westmacott RA (1775–1856).

[6] James Orrock was a Scottish artist and collector who owned several works by the artist, who he greatly admired in his lifetime.

[7] The painting was bought-in by a Norwich-based picture dealer named A. Smith.

[8] William Hesketh Lever, first Viscount of Leverhulme (1851–1925) was an English businessman and prolific art collector. Lever made his fortune through his soap manufacturing business Sunlight Soap. Lever was close with fellow collector and artist James Orrock and bought significant portions of the latter’s collection in 1904, 1910, and 1912 through a combination of auctions and private purchases. In the November following the June 1904 auction of Orrock’s pictures at Christie, Manson, & Wood, Lever purchased the remaining unsold artworks for a lumpsum of £45,000.

[9] Mollie Higgins Smith was an artist and one of the exhibition managers at the Anderson Galleries in the 1920s. During the Leverhulme sale, she worked as an agent on behalf of various buyers and dealers. It is unknown who Smith purchased the painting for.

[10] John "Jack" D. Barrett, Jr. was the former president of the Bollingen Foundation, a Yale University alum (class of 1926), and a close friend of Paul Mellon. It is unknown when he acquired this painting.

Citations:
[a] Martin Butlin and Evelyn Joll, The Paintings of J.M.W. Turner (New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1984), 290–91, no. 476, pl. 477.
[b] "Literature and the Arts," Manchester Courier and Lancashire General Advertiser, March 28, 1865.
[c] Christie, Manson & Woods, Catalogue of a Highly Important Assemblage of Water-colour Drawings and English Pictures (London: William Clowes and Sons, Ltd., 1865), 24. https://search.library.yale.edu/catalog/1680357.
[d] "Fine-Art Gossip," The Atheneum no. 1953 (1865): 463. https://www.google.com/books/edition/The_Athenaeum/7Y5UAAAAcAAJ?hl=en&gbpv=0.
[e] Algernon Graves, Art sales from early in the eighteenth century to early in the twentieth century (mostly old master and early English pictures) (London: Algernon Graves, 1918), 3:236. https://archive.org/details/graves-art-sales-vol-3/mode/2up.
[f] Christie, Manson & Woods, Catalogue of The Celebrated Collection of Pictures, Water-colour Drawings, and Sculpture of Henry Sanford Bicknell (London: William Clowes and Sons, Ltd., 1881), 62. https://search.library.yale.edu/catalog/1684926
[g] Christie, Manson & Woods, Water-colour Drawings and Pictures of T. H. Worrell, Esq., deceased; and pictures and drawings from numerous private sources (London: William Clowes and Sons, Ltd., 1898), 18.
[h] Thos. Agnew & Sons Picture Stock Book, 1898–1904, National Gallery of Art. NGA27/1/1/9. Stock No. 8691. p. 50. https://www.nationalgallery.org.uk/research/research-centre/agnew-s-stock-books/reference-nga27-1-1-9-1898-1904.
[i] Ibid. P. 51. https://www.nationalgallery.org.uk/research/research-centre/agnew-s-stock-books/reference-nga27-1-1-9-1898-1904.
[j] Thos. Agnew & Sons Picture Stock Book, 1898–1904, National Gallery of Art. NGA27/1/1/9. Stock No. 116. p. 208. https://www.nationalgallery.org.uk/research/research-centre/agnew-s-stock-books/reference-nga27-1-1-9-1898-1904.
[k] Ibid. p. 209. https://www.nationalgallery.org.uk/research/research-centre/agnew-s-stock-books/reference-nga27-1-1-9-1898-1904.
[l] Christie, Manson & Woods, Catalogue of the highly important collection of pictures and water colour drawings of James Orrock (London: Christie, Manson & Wood, 1904): 24. https://archive.org/details/highlyimp00chri/page/24/mode/2up.
[m] Edward Morris, "Paintings and Sculpture," in Lord Leverhulme: Founder of the Lady Lever Art Gallery and Port Sunlight on Merseyside (London: Royal Academy of Arts, 1980): 24.
[n] Anderson Galleries, Inc., The art collections of the late Viscount Leverhulme. Part two, Paintings: to be sold by order of the executors... (New York: Anderson Galleries, 1926): 203. https://hdl.handle.net/2027/gri.ark:/13960/s2nm6v6wt57.
[o] Malcolm Cormack, Concise Catalogue of Paintings in the Yale Center for British Art (Yale Center for British Art, New Haven, CT, 1985): 228-229