Sr. George Bridges Rodney, Rear Admiral of the Blue
Not on view
Naval portraiture was a mainstay of Reynolds's career in the seventeen-fifties and sixties. Rodney was born into an aristocratic and military family and became one of the most distinguished British naval commanders of the eighteenth century. Here he is depicted in the uniform of a Rear-Admiral with his right arm resting on the fluke of an anchor and the sea glimpsed behind. The print is based on a splendid portrait by Reynolds whose primary version is at Petworth House, Sussex. James Watson (ca. 1740–1790) was the first to engrave the latter as a large mezzotint in 1762, wishing to capitalise on Rodney's growing fame–that year his fleet successfully attacked Martinique in the West Indies and captured the islands of Saint Lucia, Grenada and Saint Vincent. This smaller plate was published in 1780 by an unidentified engraver.
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