Portrait of Colonel Daniel Parke (1664/5-1710), aide-de-camp to the 1st Duke of Marlborough, bust-length, in armour, with a miniature portrait of Queen Anne

The sitter was born in Virginia, the third, but only surviving, son of Daniel Parke (d. 1679), a London merchant, plantation owner and member of the Virginia Governor's Council, and his wife, Rebecca Knipe (d. 1672/3), a cousin of the diarist John Evelyn.
Parke was educated in England but followed his father in joining the Governor's Council in Virginia in 1695. At the opening of the War of the Spanish Succession in 1702, he attached himself to the suite of John Churchill, 1st Duke of Marlborough, travelling with him to the Low Countries. He fought with Marlborough at the Battle of Blenheim on 13th August 1704 and was entrusted with delivering the news of their victory to Queen Anne at Windsor Castle. He was rewarded with, among other gifts, a jewelled miniature portrait of the Queen, worn around his neck here and in a three-quarter-length depiction of c.1706 by Westphalian portraitist John Closterman (1660–1711), now in the collection of the Virginia Historical Society.
Parke was shortly afterwards appointed governor of the Leeward Islands in the Caribbean, arriving in Antigua in July 1706. Despite vigorous attempts to defend the islands against French raiders and privateers, Parke was murdered in 1710, closing a tenure marked by political dispute and rebellion.