Early Georgian Portraits Catalogue: Onslow

Arthur Onslow (1691-1768)

Speaker of the House of Commons; educated at Winchester and Wadham College, Oxford; barrister, Middle Temple, 1713; MP for Guildford, 1720-27; privy councillor, 1728; chancellor to Queen Caroline, 1729; recorder of Guildford, 1737; MP for Surrey and speaker of the House of Commons, 1728-61; treasurer of the navy, 1734-42; opposed the regency bill, 1751; received an annuity of £3000 and freedom of the city, 1761; a trustee of the British Museum.

1940 After a portrait by Hans Hysing of 1728
Oil on canvas, 30 x 25 in. (762 x 635 mm); near-black eyes and eyebrows, double chin, swarthy complexion, long flaxen wig; black gown with gold lace, open, over brown coat and matching waistcoat, long white lace cravat; plain brown background, lighter brown spandrels; lit from the left.

Inscribed in black in the bottom left spandrel: R^t. Hon^b Arthur Onslow, Esq^r. / ÆTAT: 38 / Speaker of the House / of Commons / 1728,and in the bottom right spandrel: And afterwards continued / Speaker during the / whole reign of / King George / the 2^d..

NPG 1940 is probably a copy of the Hysing portrait of the sitter as speaker in 1728 (his age given as 38) [1] engraved three-quarter length by Faber junior (CS 262) and lettered Anno Dⁿⁱ. 1728. Aetat suae 36. A corresponding portrait at Wadham College, with which the sitter was associated in 1708, [2] was exhibited 'Historical Portraits', Oxford, 1906 (93). Another, without artist's name, lent by the Rev A.L. Onslow and very dirty when seen at the 'NPE' 1867 (329), is at Clandon, the family seat. No other portraits exactly following this design are now known. A good example of the closely related three-quarter length version, with right hand extended, was presented to the Palace of Westminster in 1803 by the Rev. Richard Cope, Bart, [3] whose mother Anne was a daughter of Richard Onslow of Drungwick, Sussex. Another ascribed to Richardson is at the Guildhall, Guildford. The whole length in the same pose, now in the Palace of Westminster, formerly NPG 559 (seeCollections below) and at one time ascribed to Kneller, is nearer Hysing. The best version is a head and shoulders presented to the Middle Temple by the sitter's son in 1803.

Condition: thin, flat; varnish yellowed; old retouchings in the chin, neck-band, lower part of wig and cravat; small losses down side edges, pin holes in corners.

Collections: acquired from speaker's house, 1922, in exchange for the whole length, formerly NPG 559 presented to the British Museum [4] by Admiral Sir Richard Onslow, 1st Bart (1741-1817) and transferred, 1879, to the NPG; previous history of NPG 1940 not known.

Literature: B. Beckett, Hogarth, 1949; C.E. Vulliamy, The Onslow Family, 1953; R.J.B. Walker, A Catalogue of paintings . . . in the Palace of Westminster, 1960, unpublished MS.

Iconography

Apart from NPG 1940, the only other individual portrait is by Joseph Highmore, signed and dated 1735, now in the Palace of Westminster. [5] Formerly owned by Godfrey Williams it was sold Christie's, 4 October 1946, lot 103, as 'The Right Hon. Arthur Custon'—an obvious misreading. The group of MPs, with Onslow and Walpole as principal figures, inscribed Done by Sir James Thornhill then a Member of the_. House of Commons, 1730 and engraved by A. Fogg, 1803, carries a MS note by the sitter that 'some of the figures were done by Mr Hogarth'. [6] The original, presumably owned by Onslow, is still at Clandon. Reynolds was consulted about a copy for Wimpole c.1784, referred to in a letter dated 29 August 1784 from the 2nd Earl of Hardwicke to the then Earl of Onslow: 'I return you my best thanks for yr obliging compliance with my request abt Sir James Thornhills Picture. I will with yr Lordships permission consult Sir J. Reynolds abt a proper copy [?] for it . . . I think it wd be advisable to have the size . . . the same with that of the original.' [7] The portrait, listed at Wimpole 1804 [8] and lent by the Earl of Hardwicke to the 'NPE' of 1867 (285), was sold Christie's, 24 February 1939, lot 52. Another good copy possibly c.1800-10, is in the Palace of Westminster. [9] A portrait of the sitter is included in Pine's engraving of the House of Commons in session c.1741 and 'a curious one . . . in his seat at St Margaret's Church, Westminster' by A. Walker formed the frontispiece to Wilson's Ornaments of Churches considered, published 1761. [10] A memorial, possibly by Scheemakers, [11] erected by the sitter's son, is in Trinity Church, Guildford.

Notes

1. Born 3 September 1691, R. Sedgwick, House of Commons 1715-54, 1970, p.308.
2. Poole, III, p.225.
3. Walker, II, p.83 (35).
4. Listed c.1804, Harding, III, p.234.
5. Walker, II, p.83 (159); the literary portraits and others were sold from Clandon, Christie's, 23 June 1827, and the sitter's library and autograph notes at Sotheby's, March 1885.
6. Vulliamy, pp.99-100.
7. Clandon archives, kindly communicated by R. St John Gore, 3 August 1972. 8. Harding, II, p.227.
9. Walker, p.134 (190).
10. DNB, XIV, p.1112.
11. So attributed by Mrs Esdaile, verbal.