Portrait of General Albemarle Bertie, 9th Earl of Lindsey (1744-1818) and his second wife, Charlotte Susanna Elizabeth (1780-1858), daughter of the Rev. Charles Peter Layard, Dean of Bristol, full-length, he in military uniform, she in a white dress

The execution of this full-length portrait of General Albemarle Bertie, 9th Earl of Lindsay, and his second wife Charlotte Susanna Elizabeth Layard, is recorded in a letter, dated 25 September 1815, sent by Lawrence from Lord Stewart’s residence in Paris to his studio assistant in London. The letter provides a fascinating insight into the artist’s studio practice whilst he was at work on the first portraits of the allied leaders who had defeated Napoleon earlier that year, the pictures that would form the nucleus of his celebrated series for the Waterloo Chamber at Windsor. Lawrence implores ‘his coadjutor in his Atelier’ to ‘complete, exactly according to its present plan, the picture of Lord and Lady Lyndsay [sic.]. I left it in my painting room.’ (Williams, loc. cit.)

Albemarle Bertie was the son of Peregrine Bertie (1709-1779) and his wife, Elizabeth Payne. In 1762 he was commissioned in the 1st Foot Guards, the regiment for which he would later be appointed Colonel in 1781. In 1809, having reached the rank of General, he retired from active service upon inheriting the title of Earl of Lindsey from his third cousin. In 1794 he married Eliza Maria, daughter of William Clay. After Eliza's death in 1806 he married secondly, in 1809, Charlotte Susannah Elizabeth, daughter of the Very Rev. Charles Peter Layard, Dean of Bristol. The marriage produced a daughter and two sons. The family lived at Uffington House, South Kesteven, Lincolnshire (fig. 1), which was later destroyed by fire in 1904.