Lot 189: Stephen Catterson Smith P.R.H.A. (1806-1872)

Stephen Catterson Smith P.R.H.A. (1806-1872)
Portrait of Frederick, 4th Earl Spencer K.G. (1798-1857), three-quarter-length, in peer's robes, his left hand on a document, a letter in his right
oil on canvas, in a Kentian style frame
50 x 40 in. (127 x 101.6 cm.)

London, Royal Accademy, 1849, no. 341.

K. J. Garlick, The Walpole Society 'Catalogue of Paintings at Althorp' vol.45, 1974-76, p. 79, no. 610.

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The present picture of the 4th Earl was painted in 1849, the year he received The Order of the Garter. Having fought in the Napoleonic Wars in the Medittaranean between 1811 and 1815, 'Fritz', as he was known, eventually rose to the rank of Vice-Admiral before becoming an MP in 1831 until the death of his older brother the 3rd Earl in 1845 raised him to the Lords. He had three children by Elizabeth Poyntz, and then two by his second wife Adelaide Seymour, the second of whom, the 6th Earl, was born just two months before he died in 1857.