Robert Banks Jenkinson, 2nd Earl of Liverpool

Robert Banks Jenkinson, 2nd Earl of Liverpool, by Sir Thomas Lawrence, exhibited 1827 -NPG 1804 - © National Portrait Gallery, London

© National Portrait Gallery, London

Regency Portraits Catalogue

Robert Banks Jenkinson, 2nd Earl of Liverpool

by Sir Thomas Lawrence
exhibited 1827
92 in. x 56 in. (2337 mm x 1422 mm)
NPG 1804

This portraitback to top

The portrait was commissioned by Peel, then Home Secretary in Liverpool's Cabinet, and clearly relates to the foundation of the National Gallery of which Beaumont, Holwell Carr, Lord Dover and Lord Liverpool were the prime movers. A Treasury minute of 23 March 1824 announced the Government's intention to purchase the Angerstein Collection (the nucleus of the National Gallery), a list of the pictures valued, with expenses, at £60,000 was published on 26 March, and the sum was voted as part of the Civil Establishment on 2 April 1824 (Annual Register, 1824, pp 272*-3* and 1825 Chronicle, p 300). No National Gallery Act was passed nor indeed necessary and the inscribed parchment beside the sitter would therefore seem to be Lawrence's artistic licence. The portrait was ready for exhibition at the RA on 1 May 1827.

Physical descriptionback to top

Whole-length standing in a long black top-coat, dark brown suit, white waistcoat and neckcloth, gloves in right hand on hip, left on rolled up parchment inscribed: National Gallery, New Roy(al) Aca(demy) by an open despatch box on a crimson table-cloth; sparse sandy-grey hair and whiskers, brown eyes, fresh complexion.

Provenanceback to top

Sir Robert Peel; Peel Heirlooms sale, Robinson & Fisher 29 November 1917 (65) bought G. Cohen; presented by an anonymous member of the NACF 1918.

Exhibitionsback to top

RA, 1827 (117); British Institution, 1830 (50); Peel Heirlooms, Graves Gallery, 1908 (1); loan to National Gallery since 1983.


This extended catalogue entry is from the out-of-print National Portrait Gallery collection catalogue: Richard Walker, Regency Portraits, National Portrait Gallery, 1985, and is as published then. For the most up-to-date details on individual Collection works, we recommend reading the information provided in the Search the Collection results on this website in parallel with this text.

View all known portraits for Sir Thomas Lawrence

View all known portraits for Robert Banks Jenkinson, 2nd Earl of Liverpool