Portrait of George Townshend, 1st Marquess Townshend (1724-1807), half-length, in armour

We are grateful to Dr. Martin Postle for endorsing the attribution after first-hand inspection. Dr. Postle considers this the autograph prime of the composition after which two known replicas were made: a bust-length fragment and a studio replica of the present picture (both sold in these Rooms, the first on 10 February 1967, lot 58; the second on 12 November 1999, lot 11; see D. Mannings, Sir Joshua Reynolds, A Complete Catalogue of his Paintings, Text, New Haven and London, 2000, pp. 447, nos. 1762 and 1763; Plates, p. 390, figs. 925 and 926).

Evidently unknown to David Mannings by the date of his publication in 2000 (ibid.), elements of the cataloguing of the present picture appear to have been erroneously misattributed to the bust-length fragment of this composition (ibid., no. 1762). Painted around 1767, the present may indeed be that for which appointments were listed with Lord Townsend on 25 and 27 August 1767, both at nine o’clock, with his name also appearing in a short list on the accounts page opposite the week beginning 5 October (loc. cit.). The possible payment for the work may have been that recorded in an entry in Reynolds’s Ledger made between 12 May 1764 – when George Townshend succeeded as 4^th Viscount – and 6 February 1767, recording a sum of 37½ guineas due from Lord Townshend (see M. Cormack, ‘The Ledgers of Sir Joshua Reynolds’, The Volume of the Walpole Society, XLII, 1968-1970, f. 52 v., p. 141). At the back of the first of his Ledgers, dated October 1767, a technical memorandum also noted: ‘Lord Townsend. prima con magp. poi Olio, poy Mag. / Senza olio. Lacca. poi Verniciata con Virmilion./’. As Manning notes, C.L. Eastlake interpreted this to mean that ‘at the first and last sitting, the colours were mixed with megilp-mastic resin dissolved in turpentine with linseed oil (the oil apparently omitted in the last sitting), an effective but ultimately destructive additive very popular in Reynolds’s day. Lacca (i.e. lake, a fugitive red) was afterwards glazed with vermilion, a more durable but somewhat opaque colour’ (op. cit., p. 447, discussing C.L. Eastlake, Methods and Materials of Painting, I, London, 1847, p. 539).

The sitter was the eldest son of Charles Townshend, 3rd Viscount Townshend (1700-1764), and his wife, Etheldreda, the daughter and sole heir of Edward Harrison of Balls Park, Hertfordshire. King George I was one of the sponsors at his baptism on 25 March 1725.

In 1743, Townshend joined the army in Flanders as a volunteer and first saw action at the Battle of Dettingen in June of that year. Within two years, he had been appointed captain in the 7^th regiment of dragoons and, during the Jacobite Rising, served under the Duke of Cumberland at Culloden in 1746. Following a dispute with Cumberland, this period of his military career was brought to an end. On 19 December 1751, he married Lady Charlotte Compton (d. 1770), the second daughter of James Compton, 5^th Earl of Northampton, and his wife Elizabeth Shirley, Baroness Ferrers in her own right. Townshend’s wife succeeded to her mother’s title in 1747 and inherited her father’s title in 1754, since she was by then his sole heir.

In 1747, he was elected as MP for Norfolk. Townshend was acutely aware of the importance of propaganda and public opinion; his pictorial satire, inspired by the works of Hogarth, was used against his enemies (including Cumberland) to reinforce his political views. Horace Walpole, who observed that ‘his likenesses in caricature is astonishing’, noted that Townshend was the first to introduce personal caricature into political prints. It is doubtful whether Townshend’s significance in the development of satirical art helped advance his career; King George II was displeased by his foray into ‘low’ art and he accrued a considerable number of political enemies.

Following the retirement of Cumberland, Townshend was able to resume his military career. In May 1758, he was promoted to the rank of colonel and appointed aide-de-camp to George II. The following year he served (as brigadier) under Major-General James Wolfe, who led the expedition against French-held Quebec. After Wolfe’s death on the battlefield, Townshend took command of the British forces during the Battle of the Plains of Abraham and received the surrender of Quebec on 18 September 1759.

He succeeded his father as Viscount Townshend in 1764 and, in August 1767, was appointed Lord Lieutenant of Ireland in the Chatham Ministry, the highest office he attained during a tumultuous political career. In 1786, he was created Marquess Townshend of Raynham, and in the latter years of his life held a number of offices, including lord lieutenant and vice-admiral of the county of Norfolk.