Lot Essay
The sitters were the children of John, 10th Earl of Rothes (d. 1767) and Hannah (d. 1761), daughter and co-heiress of Matthew Howard of Thorpe. John (1744-1773), the eldest son, married Jane Maitland in 1768. Upon his death at the age of twenty-nine the title passed to his sister, Jane Elizabeth (1750-1810), who became Countess of Rothes in her own right. Her uncle, the Hon. Andrew Leslie, Equerry to the Dowager Princess of Wales, disputed this but the Court of Session in the House of Lords decided in her favour. She married George Raymond Evelyn of St. Clere (d. 1770) in 1766 by whom she had a son, George William, later 13th Earl of Rothes. She married secondly, in 1772, Sir Lucas Pepys, 2nd Bt., (d. 1830) by whom she had two sons and a daughter.
The present picture was cut down after 1954 when photographed in the Spencer Nairn Collection at Leslie House. Mr. Kirby Talley (op. cit.) records the painting as measuring 84 by 71ins. and on the basis of the photograph included to the left, seated, the Hon. Charles Leslie who died in 1762 aged 15 and behind, held by a governess, Mary as a baby.
The present picture was cut down after 1954 when photographed in the Spencer Nairn Collection at Leslie House. Mr. Kirby Talley (op. cit.) records the painting as measuring 84 by 71ins. and on the basis of the photograph included to the left, seated, the Hon. Charles Leslie who died in 1762 aged 15 and behind, held by a governess, Mary as a baby.