Richard Crosse, Portrait of an Officer of the Foot Guards, ca. 1765

Chicago:

Maggie Keenan, “Richard Crosse, Portrait of an Officer of the Foot Guards, ca. 1765,” catalogue entry in Aimee Marcereau DeGalan, Blythe Sobol, and Maggie Keenan, The Starr Collection of Portrait Miniatures, 1500–1850: The Collections of the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, vol. 2, ed. Aimee Marcereau DeGalan (Kansas City, MO: Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, 2024), https://doi.org/10.37764/8322.5.1352.

MLA:

Keenan, Maggie. “Richard Crosse, Portrait of an Officer of the Foot Guards, ca. 1765,” catalogue entry. Aimee Marcereau DeGalan, Blythe Sobol, and Maggie Keenan. The Starr Collection of Portrait Miniatures, 1500–1850: The Collections of the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, edited by Aimee Marcereau DeGalan, vol. 2, Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, 2024. doi: 10.37764/8322.5.1352.

See the artist’s biography in volume 4.

This sitter wears the uniform of an officer of the Foot Guards: a scarlet coat with blue facings trimmed in gold lace, along with a light buff waistcoat.¹ Additional details include a black leather stock and turnover collar, with a white lace cravat that escapes just above the buttons of the waistcoat.² Delicately rendered, the cravat adds an extravagant flourish to the sitter’s otherwise simple undress uniform, worn for informal occasions.³ A gold aiguillette adorns the officer’s right shoulder and continues off the shoulder as a braided cord, although this is cut off by the cropped composition. The sitter’s powdered hair is styled in a queue, presumably tied back by a ribbon, and a dark green background heightens his faded pale complexion.⁴

Despite the uniform’s overall simplicity, flecks of gold paint along the shallow scarlet collar imply an embroidered embellishment. The seemingly random splatter of gold dots are an unusual and easily missed detail, but, like the cravat and aiguillette, it adds distinction to this portrait of an unknown sitter. His collar, neither folded nor standing, helps date the painting between 1760 and 1768, early in Richard Crosse’s career.⁵ It is possible the officer commissioned the miniature to commemorate his return from battle, since undress uniforms sometimes signified relaxation or retirement following battle.⁶

Notes

1. Major A. McKenzie Annand, “Captain and Lieutenant-Colonel The Honourable Edmund Nugent, 1st Foot Guards, c. 1765,” Journal of the Society for Army Historical Research 52, no. 209 (Spring 1974): 15; Carl Franklin, British Army Uniforms from 1751 to 1783 (Barnsley, UK: Pen and Sword Books, 2013), 156, 160; David Fraser, The Grenadier Guards (London: Osprey, 1998), 4; George Usher, “Foot Guards,” Dictionary of British Military History (London: Bloomsbury, 2009), 94–95. The 1st, 2nd, and 3rd Foot Guards all wore scarlet jackets with blue lapels and white waistcoats. Still operational today, the guards are now responsible for guarding the royal residences. Military uniform specialist Christopher Bryant assisted with the date and identification of this miniature. Bryant to the author, December 6, 2019.

2. A. S. Matthews, “John Floyd and the Uniform of the 15th Light Dragoons,” Journal of the Society for Army Historical Research 48, no. 195 (1970): 145; Percy Sumner, “Uniforms and Equipment of Cavalry Regiments, from 1685 to 1811,” Journal of the Society for Army Historical Research 13, no. 50 (Summer 1934): 100.

3. Usher, “Dress,” Dictionary of British Military History (London: Bloomsbury Publishing, 2009), 75.

4. Daphne Foskett, “Richard Crosse,” Miniatures: Dictionary and Guide (Woodbridge: Antique Collectors Club, 1987), 22, 378. Crosse’s fugitive red pigments have led to significant fading over time.

5. The British wore this style of cape or falling collar in the 1760s, eventually transitioning to a collar whose color matched the lapels. In this miniature, the sitter’s collar matches his coat’s red shell color. The Royal Clothing Warrant of 1768 subsequently changed all military uniform regulations. Basil Long, “Richard Crosse, Miniaturist and Portrait-Painter,” The Volume of the Walpole Society 17 (1928–1929): 61. Crosse began exhibiting at the Society of Arts in 1760 and did not exhibit at the Royal Academy until 1770.

6. Daniel O’Quinn, “Facing Past and Future Empires: Joshua Reynolds’s Portraits of Augustus Keppel,” The Culture of the Seven Years’ War: Empire, Identity, and the Arts in the Eighteenth-Century Atlantic World, ed. Frans de Bruyn and Shaun Regan (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2014), 323.

Unknown owner, by May 21, 1953 [1];

Purchased from the unknown owner’s sale, Catalogue of Portrait Miniatures, Rare Table Clocks, Watches and Other Objects of Vertu, Sotheby’s, London, May 21, 1953, lot 56, as An Officer, by Leggatt Brothers, London, probably on behalf of Mr. John W. (1905–2000) and Mrs. Martha Jane (1906–2011) Starr, Kansas City, MO, by May 2, 1953–1958 [2];

Their gift to The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, MO, 1958.

Notes

[1] In the Sotheby’s May 21, 1953 sale, “Various Properties” sold lots 12–78.

[2] “An Officer, by Richard Crosse, head and shoulders three-quarters dexter, powdered hair en queue, wearing red coat with blue and gold facings, 1 1/2 in., in gold and enamel frame.” The annotated catalogue for this sale is located at the University of Missouri-Kansas City, Miller Nichols Library. The annotations are most likely by Mr. or Mrs. Starr. Lot 56 is circled in pen and pencil. A “£10” and “28 [illegible]” is written in pen to the left of the lot. Lot 56 also included a miniature by Sampson Towgood Roch of Samuel Francis Dashwood, now in the Starr Collection, see F58-60/119. Leggatt bought lot 56 for £10. Archival research indicates that the Starrs purchased many miniatures from Leggatt Brothers, either directly or with Leggatt acting as their purchasing agent.

The Starr Foundation Collection of Miniatures, The Royal Ontario Museum, Toronto, December 8, 1972–January 14, 1973, no cat., no. 56, as Unknown Officer.

Catalogue of Portrait Miniatures, Rare Table Clocks, Watches and Other Objects of Vertu (London: Sotheby’s, May 21, 1953), 8, as An Officer.

Ross E. Taggart, The Starr Collection of Miniatures in the William Rockhill Nelson Gallery (Kansas City, MO: Nelson Gallery-Atkins Museum, 1971), no. 65, p. 23, (repro.), as Unknown Officer.