Royal Subject: Portraits of Queen Charlotte

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Charlotte landed in England on September 8, 1761, and married George that same night, within six hours of her arrival. Two weeks later, the couple held a joint coronation; it ran so long that members of the congregation started eating during the sermon. Within a year of her wedding, Charlotte gave birth to the future George IV—the first of the couple’s 15 children, 13 of whom survived to adulthood.

Painting by G. D. Matthieu, three-quarter length seated, the King’s miniature on her left wrist. Gripsholm Castle (Katalog, Portratt fore 1809, 1951, no.1192). Medal by Thomas Wyon sr. and T. Martyn, with conjoined busts of the King and Queen (L. Brown, A Catalogue of British Historical Medals 1760-1960: The Accession of George III to the Death of William IV, 1980, no.628).Like her husband, Queen Charlotte was also interested in books and her substantial library included many volumes on botany, literature and the theatre. In the early 1790s she acquired the Frogmore estate at Windsor which she and her daughters used increasingly as a rural retreat, particularly for botanical and artistic activity. Queen Charlotte commissioned Mary Moser, a founder member of the Royal Academy, to decorate the walls and ceiling at Frogmoremaking the house not just a female domain but one with links to some of the most important female artists and patrons in the eighteenth century. Though she spoke no English and had never met her husband before her wedding day, Charlotte was now Queen of Great Britain and Ireland. Everyone wanted to greet the new king and queen: At their coronation, so many well-wishers crowded them that it took two hours to for their procession to make it from the street into Westminster Abbey. Soon, Charlotte had her first child, a daughter. She would go on to bear 15 children during her long marriage. Were Queen Charlotte and King George in love? Unattributed pastel, resembling the Ramsay pattern of 1762. The Prince of Hanover. With a companion piece of the King. Medal by Wilmore, Alston & Co (L. Brown, A Catalogue of British Historical Medals 1760-1960: The Accession of George III to the Death of William IV, 1980, nos.278-79). The principal surveys of Charlotte’s iconography are contained in the catalogues of the Royal Collection (Sir Oliver Millar, The Later Georgian Pictures in the Collection of Her Majesty The Queen, I, 1969 and R. J. B. Walker, The eighteenth and early nineteenth century Miniatures in the Collection of Her Majesty The Queen, 1992) and in the National Gallery exhibition catalogue by Michael Levey (M. Levey, A Royal Subject, Portraits of Queen Charlotte, 1977).

King GeorgeIII and Queen Charlotte were music connoisseurs with German tastes, who gave special honour to German artists and composers. They were passionate admirers of the music of George Frideric Handel. [26] This portrait of Queen Charlotte forms part of the series of fifteen portraits probably commissioned by Queen Charlotte of the royal family. They were painted at Windsor in September and October 1782. On 30 October the Morning Herald reported that Gainsborough ‘has just completed his painting of the whole Royal Family, at Windsor... all of which are spoken of as highly-finished characteristic portraits of the illustrious personages who sat to him’. All the portraits were exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1783 (134).Painting by Thomas Gainsborough, bust-length painted oval. Royal Collection (E. K. Waterhouse, Gainsborough, 1958, no.132; Sir Oliver Millar, The Later Georgian Pictures in the Collection of Her Majesty The Queen, I, 1969, no.779, pl.50). Replica in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, and a copy in the Victoria and Albert Museum (91.1879). In the Royal Collection an enamel miniature by Henry Bone 1804, and two miniature copies attributed to Richard Collins (R. J. B. Walker, The eighteenth and early nineteenth century Miniatures in the Collection of Her Majesty The Queen, 1992, nos.749, 170-71); further miniature copies, by Robert Bowyer, Richard Crosse, William Grimaldi, and Anne Mee, are listed by Walker (R. J. B. Walker, The eighteenth and early nineteenth century Miniatures in the Collection of Her Majesty The Queen, 1992, p 85). Lawrence implored the Queen for one more brief sitting so that he might paint her jewels, several of which were wedding presents from the King. The Queen refused, but allowed the Assistant Keeper of her Wardrobe to model the jewellery for Lawrence. Charlotte was unknown and thought to have no political connections or aims. This was seen as a plus by George’s political advisers, who wanted British interests to prevail after the king’s marriage. And so, though George had never met Charlotte, in 1761 an emissary proposed marriage on his behalf. Charlotte accepted, and the arranged marriage took place just six hours after the young princess arrived in England. These bouts of illness devastated the queen. “The queen is almost overpowered with some secret terror,” wrote Francis Burney, one of Charlotte’s attendants, in 1788. “I am affected beyond all expression in her presence, to see what struggles she makes to support serenity.” Over time, the bouts turned into lengthy episodes, and the king was isolated and even incarcerated. Although the queen dutifully carried out her obligation to bear heirs to the royal throne, being constantly pregnant for almost 20 years of her life did take its toll. She kept mum about her feelings in public but shared them privately with her closest confidants.

Allan Ramsay was born on October 13, 1713, in Edinburgh, Scotland, and died on August 10, 1784 and died in Dover, Kent in the United Kingdom. His studies included institutions like the Academy of Saint Luke in Edinburgh and in Italy in Rome.

Less than a year after the marriage, on 12 August 1762, the queen gave birth to her first child, George, Prince of Wales. In the course of their marriage, the couple became the parents of 15 children, [10] all but two of whom ( Octavius and Alfred) survived into adulthood. [11] [12] [13] Wax by Thomas Engleheart. Royal Collection (illus. E. J. Pyke, A Biographical Dictionary of Wax Modellers, 1973, pl.89). Margarita de Castro e Souza herself descended from King Alfonso III of Portugal and his concubine, Madragana, a Moor that Alfonso III took as his lover after conquering the town of Faro in southern Portugal.