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Lot Essay
This three-quarter-length portrait of Lady Frances Marsham, later Countess of Romney, is a version of Reynolds’s magnificent full-length, sold in these Rooms, 8 July 2014, lot 67 (1776; private collection). Painted for the sitter’s sister, Elizabeth, and her husband, Henry Herbert, 1st Earl of Carnarvon, the present canvas hung at Highclere Castle, Newbury, where it remained until the 1925 sale in these Rooms. Shortly thereafter, it was acquired by the grandfather of the present owner (see provenance). We are grateful to Martin Postle for endorsing the cataloguing of this lot following his first-hand inspection of the work. Dr Postle observes that the picture was likely executed in large part by an assistant in Reynolds’s studio.
The sitter was the daughter of Charles Wyndham, 2nd Earl of Egremont (1710-1763), and his wife the Hon. Alicia Maria Carpenter. On 30 August 1776 she married Charles Marsham (1744-1811), the son of Robert Marsham, 2nd Baron Romney and Priscilla Pym. The sitter’s husband was M.P. for Maidstone in Kent between 1768-1774 and was later Lord Lieutenant of the county from 1797-1808. In 1799 he entertained King George III at their seat, Moat House, Maidstone, when the king reviewed three thousand of the Kentish volunteers. Succeeding as 3rd Baron Romney in 1793, he was created Viscount Marsham of the Mote in the County of Kent, and Earl of Romney in 1801. The sitter’s father, who served as Secretary of State in the Earl of Bute’s government, was a significant collector and patron of the arts. Lord Egremont employed Matthew Brettingham, the executant architect of Holkham Hall, at Petworth House, his seat in Sussex, and commissioned him to design Egremont House in Piccadilly. This celebrated London palace overlooking Green Park would house one of the finest mid-18th-century picture collections in England until the house was sold in 1794 by the sitter’s brother, George, the 3rd Earl, and the contents moved to Petworth. The 3rd Earl’s seventy-five year reign at Petworth is regarded as the house’s golden age, and at his death in 1837 there were (and remain) more than 600 pictures in the collection, including twenty portraits by van Dyck and the same number of works by Lord Egremont’s friend, J.M.W. Turner.
The sitter was the daughter of Charles Wyndham, 2nd Earl of Egremont (1710-1763), and his wife the Hon. Alicia Maria Carpenter. On 30 August 1776 she married Charles Marsham (1744-1811), the son of Robert Marsham, 2nd Baron Romney and Priscilla Pym. The sitter’s husband was M.P. for Maidstone in Kent between 1768-1774 and was later Lord Lieutenant of the county from 1797-1808. In 1799 he entertained King George III at their seat, Moat House, Maidstone, when the king reviewed three thousand of the Kentish volunteers. Succeeding as 3rd Baron Romney in 1793, he was created Viscount Marsham of the Mote in the County of Kent, and Earl of Romney in 1801. The sitter’s father, who served as Secretary of State in the Earl of Bute’s government, was a significant collector and patron of the arts. Lord Egremont employed Matthew Brettingham, the executant architect of Holkham Hall, at Petworth House, his seat in Sussex, and commissioned him to design Egremont House in Piccadilly. This celebrated London palace overlooking Green Park would house one of the finest mid-18th-century picture collections in England until the house was sold in 1794 by the sitter’s brother, George, the 3rd Earl, and the contents moved to Petworth. The 3rd Earl’s seventy-five year reign at Petworth is regarded as the house’s golden age, and at his death in 1837 there were (and remain) more than 600 pictures in the collection, including twenty portraits by van Dyck and the same number of works by Lord Egremont’s friend, J.M.W. Turner.