Portrait of Mary Townshend (1762-1821), later Countess of Chatham, three-quarter-length, in a blue dress with white lace collar and cuffs, a nosegay of flowers in her right hand, her left hand resting on a plinth

Details

Sir Joshua Reynolds, P.R.A. (1723-1792)
Portrait of Mary Townshend (1762-1821), later Countess of Chatham, three-quarter-length, in a blue dress with white lace collar and cuffs, a nosegay of flowers in her right hand, her left hand resting on a plinth
oil on canvas
36½ x 28 in. (92.8 x 71.1 cm.)

Provenance

Presumably by descent through the sitter's brother to,
John Robert Townshend, 3rd Viscount Sydney (later 1st Earl Sydney) (d.1890), by 1867, and by descent to,
Robert Marsham-Townshend, the above's nephew, by 1899.
with Knoedler's, London.
Private Collection, USA, by 1941.

Literature

A. Graves and W.V. Cronin, A History of the Works of Sir Joshua Reynolds, London, 1899-1901, III, p.984.
E.K. Waterhouse, Reynolds, London, 1941, p.42.
D. Mannings, Sir Joshua Reynolds: A Complete Catalogue of his paintings, London 2000, p.448.

Exhibited

South Kensington, London, National Portrait Exhibition, 1867, no.425 (lent by Viscount Sydney, G.C.B.)

Special notice

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Lot Essay

As the daughter of Thomas Townshend (1701-1780), politician, and his wife Albinia (1713/14-1739), daughter of Colonel John Selwyn, the sitter was born into an extremely well-connected and politically influential family, with links to the Selwyns, Walpoles and Pelhams. Her uncle was the wit and politician George Augustus Selwyn (1719-1791); and her brother, Thomas, 1st Viscount Sydney (1733-1800), was Home Secretary under William Pitt. The sitter's maternal-grandfather, John Selwyn (1688-1751) was Secretary of State under Walpole and the famous clash between these two men, which was satirized in act II, scene X of John Gay's The Beggar's Opera, occurred in the sitter's grandparents' house at Cleveland Court, St James's, Westminster.

Mannings dates this portrait to c.1757, noting appointments and sittings for a Kitcat-format portrait of a 'Miss Townsend' between April 1757 and January 1759 (op.cit). Reynolds painted the sitter's brother-in-law, George Brodrick, 3rd Viscount Midleton (1730-1765), in the same year (untraced; ibid., p.58, no.41).

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