Georgiana Cavendish (née Spencer), Duchess of Devonshire

© National Portrait Gallery, London

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Georgiana Cavendish (née Spencer), Duchess of Devonshire

by Richard Josey, after Thomas Gainsborough
mezzotint, published 1877
8 1/2 in. x 6 1/2 in. (216 mm x 164 mm) plate size; 11 1/8 in. x 8 3/8 in. (281 mm x 214 mm) paper size
Purchased with help from the Friends of the National Libraries and the Pilgrim Trust, 1966
Reference Collection
NPG D1754

Sitterback to top

Artistsback to top

  • Thomas Gainsborough (1727-1788), Portrait and landscape painter. Artist or producer associated with 268 portraits, Sitter in 8 portraits.
  • Richard Josey (1840-1906), Engraver. Artist or producer associated with 47 portraits.

Related worksback to top

  • NPG D1753: Georgiana Cavendish (née Spencer), Duchess of Devonshire (from same plate)

Subject/Themeback to top

Events of 1877back to top

Current affairs

Trial of social activists Annie Besant and Charles Bradlaugh following their publication of a book by the American birth-control campaigner Charles Knowlton, which suggested that working class families should be able to practice birth control. Although found guilty, the case was thrown out on a technical fault.

Art and science

The Grosevenor Gallery opens, founded by Sir Coutts Lindsay, as a rival to the Royal Academy. It exhibited work by artists such as Edward Burne-Jones and Walter Crane, outside of the British mainstream, and became famous as the home of the Aesthetic movement.
The first Lawn Tennis Championship is held at Wimbledon with around 20 male competitors, witnessed by a few hundred spectators. Spencer Gore the first singles champion, wins 12 guineas.

International

The American inventor Thomas Edison invents the tin foil phonograph, combining the technologies of the telegraph and telephone. Experimenting with a stylus on a tinfoil cylinder, he recorded and played back the short message 'Mary had a little lamb'.

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