The artist exhibited this work with two other portraits in the 1785 Academy exhibition at Somerset House, the year after Gainsborough's dispute with the Hanging Committee. Stuart chose not to follow up the enthusiasm he had shared with Gainsborough, Romney and Wright of Derby to set up a rival exhibition freed from the constraints of the committee. His pictures were well received but one review in particular was notable not because it was written by John Hoppner, Stuart's friend and rival, but because it was a thinly-veiled attack on John Singleton Copley rather than a plaudit of Stuart's work.

"No. 160. Portrait of a Gentleman, Whole length. Before the merits of this portrait can be fairly estimated it is necessary to enquire in what the excellence consists. If in figures floundering from the midst of a quantity of fluttering drapery, a flag, a cannon and a smoky background, this picture is deficient. If it is a background decorated with dead trees, green clouds and yellow water, this picture is deficient. If in covering the parts of the canvas not occupied by the figure with garlands of roses and lilies and tulips and parrots' feathers to prevent the eye from resting upon the principal feature, this picture is deficient.

For it is only a plain and admirably well painted portrait of Captain Gell, without any trickery to dazzle the eye or mislead the judgment. The likeness is very strong, which we understand to be almost invariably the case with the portraits of this artist. The water does not seem to be painted from the same pallet as the figure, nor is it sufficiently limpid. If the air and posture of the figure may be thought stiff it should be considered that it is characteristic in a veteran officer, and if it should be thought coldly correct, that correctness, perhaps, was all the painter had in view. We confess a partiality for young artists who aim at something."

(John Hoppner, Morning Post, 9 May 1785)