约翰·杰克逊认领

Actor. William Smith, known as 'Gentleman Smith', was educated at Eton; he took a wide range of leading roles at Covent Garden and Drury Lane from 1753 to 1788, appearing as Richard III under Garrick and creating the part of Charles Surface in Sheridan's comedy, A School For Scandal, 1777.A version of the lost portrait commissioned by Sir George Beaumont, perhaps from the sitter's own collection and certainly in the possession of the Smith family from an early date.

The sitter was the eldest son of Sir Henry Phipps, 1st Earl of Mulgrave (1755-1831). He was educated at Harrow and Trinity College, Cambridge, and entered Parliament in 1818 as MP for Scarborough. He supported parliamentary reform, and held numerous government posts, including Governor of Jamaica (1832-4) and Lord Lieutenant of Ireland (1835-9). He was transferred to the Home Office in 1839, where he remained until the fall of the ministry in 1841. Thereafter he became ambassador at Paris (1846-52), and minister at Florence (1854-8), in which posts he was thought to have meddled too much in the politics of foreign states. He was created Marquis of Normanby on 25th June 1838.