According to a cutting from a catalogue glued on the reverse of the stretcher, the present portrait "as well as all the other contemporaneous portraits" was presented to the Earl of Hyndford during his Embassy to the Courts of Russia and Prussia.

When Frederick II invaded Silesia in 1741, the Earl of Hyndford was sent to George II as envoy extraordinary and plenipotentiary to mediate between the king and Maria Theresa. In 1744, Hyndford was sent again for a special mission, but this time to Russia, when his skilful negociations greatly accelerated the peace of Aix-la-Chapelle.