Painter in oils and watercolours and etcher of London scenes. The son of Charles Greaves, a Chelsea boatbuilder and waterman, and brother of Henry Greaves, he trained as a shipwright and meanwhile started to draw and paint the river.

In the early 1860s he met Whistler who became a close friend and with his brother he took Whistler on the river, acted as studio assistant and became Whistler’s pupil. Their friendship lasted until the early 1880s. He exhibited mainly at the Goupil Gallery which held exhibitions of his work in 1911 and 1922, at the Grosvenor Gallery and in the provinces.

His work is represented in collections including the Tate Gallery, and recent exhibitions have been held at the Parkin Gallery in 1980 and 1984. Much of his life was spent in poverty and in 1919 a dinner was organised by William Nicholson and William Rothenstein to restore his reputation damaged by accusations that Whistler had painted some of this work. In 1922 his painting Hammersmith Bridge on Boat Race Day, c.1862, was purchased by the Chantrey Bequest for the Tate Gallery and in the same year he was admitted to the Charterhouse as a Poor Brother where he remained until his death.

His early work was painted in a naive, primitive style but subsequent paintings shared many characteristics with those of Whistler.