Thomas Gainsborough was an English portrait and landscape painter, draughtsman, and printmaker. Along with his rival Sir Joshua Reynolds, he is considered one of the most important British artists of the second half of the 18th century. He painted quickly, and the works of his maturity are characterised by a light palette and easy strokes. Despite being a prolific portrait painter, Gainsborough gained greater satisfaction from his landscapes. He is credited as the originator of the 18th-century British landscape school. Gainsborough was a founding member of the Royal Academy.
The Foundling Museum in Brunswick Square, London, tells the story of the Foundling Hospital, Britain's first home for children at risk of abandonment. The museum houses the nationally important Foundling Hospital Collection as well as the Gerald Coke Handel Collection, an internationally important collection of material relating to Handel and his contemporaries. After a major building refurbishment, the museum was reopened to the public in June 2004.
Sir Henry Raeburn was a Scottish portrait painter. He served as Portrait Painter to King George IV in Scotland.
John Montagu, 4th Earl of Sandwich, PC, FRS was a British statesman who succeeded his grandfather Edward Montagu, 3rd Earl of Sandwich as the Earl of Sandwich in 1729, at the age of ten. He held various military and political offices, including Postmaster General, First Lord of the Admiralty, and Secretary of State for the Northern Department. He is also known for the claim that he was the inventor of the sandwich.
Queen's House is a former royal residence built between 1616 and 1635. It was built near the now demolished Greenwich Palace, a few miles downriver from the City of London and is now in the London borough of Greenwich. It presently forms a central focus of what is now the Old Royal Naval College with a grand vista leading to the River Thames, a World Heritage Site called, Maritime Greenwich. The Queen's House architect, Inigo Jones, was commissioned by Queen Anne of Denmark in 1616 and again to finish the house in 1635 by Queen Henrietta Maria. The House was commissioned by both Anne and Henrietta as a retreat and place to display and enjoy the artworks they had accumulated and commissioned; this includes a ceiling of the Great Hall that features a work by Orazio Gentileschi titled Allegory of Peace and the Arts.
Ranger's House is a medium-sized red brick Georgian mansion in the Palladian style, adjacent to Greenwich Park in the south east of London. It is situated in Blackheath and backs directly onto Greenwich Park. Previously known as Chesterfield House, its current name is associated with the Ranger of Greenwich Park, a royal appointment; the house was the Ranger's official residence for most of the 19th century. It is a Grade I listed building. There is a rose garden behind it, and since 2002 it has housed the Wernher Collection of art.
George Montagu, 4th Duke of Manchester PC was a British politician and diplomat.
Martha Ray was a British singer of the Georgian era. Her father was a corsetmaker and her mother was a servant in a noble household. Good-looking, intelligent, and a talented singer, she came to the attention of many of her father's patrons. She is best known for her affair with John Montagu, 4th Earl of Sandwich. She lived with him as his mistress from the age of seventeen, while his wife was suffering from mental illness. She gave birth to nine children, five of whom survived, including the lawyer and philanthropist Basil Montagu. During this time, she conducted a successful singing career, for which she became well known, as well as completing her education with Lord Sandwich's support.
Sir Peter Lely was a painter of Dutch origin whose career was nearly all spent in England, where he became the dominant portrait painter to the court. He became a naturalised British subject and was knighted in 1679.
Edward Montagu, 2nd Earl of Sandwich was an English aristocrat and politician.
Kinfauns Castle is a 19th-century castle in the Scottish village of Kinfauns, Perth and Kinross. It is in the Castellated Gothic style, with a slight asymmetry typical of Scottish Georgian. It stands on a raised terrace facing south over the River Tay. The house is protected as a category A listed building, and the grounds are included in the Inventory of Gardens and Designed Landscapes in Scotland.
Charles Noel Noel, 1st Earl of Gainsborough, known as Charles Edwardes until 1798, as Charles Noel between 1798 and 1823 and as the Lord Barham between 1823 and 1841, was a British peer and Whig politician.
Henry Perronet Briggs RA was an English painter of portraits and historical scenes.
Gainsborough's House is the birthplace of the leading English painter Thomas Gainsborough. It is now a museum and gallery, located at 46 Gainsborough Street in Sudbury, Suffolk, England. It is a Grade I listed building. Some of the pictures on display have been acquired with the help of the Art Fund.
Le Cheminant Watch Company is a brand that dates back to the first half of the 19th century. Originally a jeweller, it has since become principally a watch maker and, in the early 20th century, supplied chronometers and deck watches to the Royal Navy. Since the 1950s it has concentrated on watches and is currently based in Surrey, England.
The Additional Civil Lord of the Admiralty or formally the Office of the Additional Civil Lord of the Admiralty sometimes called the Department of the Additional Civil Lord of the Admiralty was a member of the Board of Admiralty first from 1882 to 1885 and then again from 1912 to 1919 who was mainly responsible for administration of contracts for matériel for the Fleet, supervision of the contracts and purchase department and general organisation of dockyards within the Admiralty.
Elizabeth Brudenell, Countess of Cardigan, formerly Lady Elizabeth Bruce, was an English noblewoman and a petitioner for the foundation of the Foundling Hospital in London. Her husband was George Brudenell, 3rd Earl of Cardigan, and she was the mother of the 4th Earl, who later became 1st Duke of Montagu.
Lady Elizabeth Montagu, known as Betty Montagu, was a British novelist, nurse, and art collector. The daughter of the 9th Earl of Sandwich and the American heiress Alberta Sturges, she grew up at Hinchingbrooke House in Huntingdon and was educated at North Foreland Lodge. A prominent debutante in the 1930s, she was active in the London Season before World War II. When war broke out in Europe, she volunteered as a nurse, heading the casualties department at St. Thomas' Hospital in London. After the war ended, she served on the teaching staff at the Royal College of Nursing until 1950.
Napoleon on the Bellerophon is an 1815 painting by the British artist Charles Lock Eastlake. It depicts the deposed Emperor of France Napoleon Bonaparte as a prisoner aboard the Royal Navy ship-of-the-line HMS Bellerophon in Plymouth Sound. Eastlake was a young, largely unknown artist at the time, but later went on to become President of the Royal Academy. It is also known by the longer title Napoleon on Board the Bellerophon in Plymouth Sound.
The Piazza at Havana is a landscape painting by the French-born British artist Dominic Serres. It depicts the scene during the British occupation of Havana in Cuba following Britain's capture of the city from Spain during the Seven Years' War. British troops in redcoats are shown parading in the Plaza Vieja while British sailors are in the foreground. Serres painted a series of works focusing on the taking of Havana for the Keppel family, three of whom led the British campaign. The title uses the Italian loan word piazza, common in English during the era, rather than the Spanish plaza.
