Royal Subject: Portraits of Queen Charlotte

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She shared a love of botany and plants with her husband, who became known as “Farmer George” due to his agricultural interests. The 'madness' of King George

These bouts of illness devastated the queen. “The queen is almost overpowered with some secret terror,” wrote Francis Burney, one of Charlotte’s attendants, in 1788. “I am affected beyond all expression in her presence, to see what struggles she makes to support serenity.” Over time, the bouts turned into lengthy episodes, and the king was isolated and even incarcerated. The queen became an accomplished interior decorator, overseeing the design of the newly constructed Queen’s Lodge, a new addition on the royal Windsor estate, and Queen Charlotte’s Cottage in Kew Gardens (two favorite family retreats). She was also a keen botanist and a champion of a number of garden projects at Kew. In later life, once her husband’s physical and mental health was failing, she found solace in throwing herself into doing up a new residence for herself, Frogmore House (now of the Duke and Duchess of Sussex fame). A significant patron of the arts who loved going to concerts, she even hired Johann Christian Bach (son of the renowned composer) as her music master. Both Charlotte and the king were fond of German composers like Handel, and she is known to have helped nurture the career of a young Mozart, who performed for her when he was just eight years old. Desmond Shawe-Taylor, a surveyor of the Queen’s pictures, believes that the theory of Queen Charlotte’s ancestry isn’t supported by Ramsay’s portraits.Drawing by Henry Edridge, whole-length seated. Royal Collection, where there is also a duplicate dated 1804 (A. P. Oppé, English Drawings, Stuart and Georgian periods, in the Collection of His Majesty the King at Windsor Castle, 1950, nos.198-99, pl.10). A half-length miniature copy attributed to John Hopkins in the Royal Collection (R. J. B. Walker, The eighteenth and early nineteenth century Miniatures in the Collection of Her Majesty The Queen, 1992, no.833); another by Paul Fischer, dated 1823, sold Sotheby’s, 10 June 1993, lot 173, from Stanton Harcourt. Wikimedia Commons Some historians believe that certain artists whitewashed their portraits of Queen Charlotte to comply with beauty standards of the time.

Miniature by J. R., bust length. Royal Collection (R. J. B. Walker, The eighteenth and early nineteenth century Miniatures in the Collection of Her Majesty The Queen, 1992, no.296). Drawing by John Downman, whole-length seated. Christie’s, 9 July 1991, lot 55. Apparently derived from the drawing of 1783, see above. Painting on copper by Johann Zoffany, bust length in robes of state. Royal Collection (Sir Oliver Millar, The Later Georgian Pictures in the Collection of Her Majesty The Queen, I, 1969, no.1198). Miniature by Edward Miles, bust length. Royal Collection (R. J. B. Walker, The eighteenth and early nineteenth century Miniatures in the Collection of Her Majesty The Queen, 1992, no.270). The Queen sat to Miles on 4 April 1794.Medals by Thomas Wyon sr. and C. H. Küchler with conjoined busts of the King and Queen (L. Brown, A Catalogue of British Historical Medals 1760-1960: The Accession of George III to the Death of William IV, 1980, nos.338-40). As the King gradually became permanently insane, the queen's personality altered: she developed a terrible temper, sank into depression, and no longer enjoyed appearing in public, not even at the musical concerts she had so loved; and her relationships with her adult children became strained. [24] From 1792 she found some relief from her worry about her husband by planning the gardens and decoration of a new residence for herself, Frogmore House, in Windsor Home Park. [25] Medals by John Kirk (L. Brown, A Catalogue of British Historical Medals 1760-1960: The Accession of George III to the Death of William IV, 1980, nos.168, 184). At the queen's death, her eldest son, the Prince Regent, claimed Charlotte's jewels, and on his death they were in turn claimed by his heir, WilliamIV. On William's death, Charlotte's bequest then sparked a protracted dispute between her granddaughter Queen Victoria, who claimed the jewels as the property of the British Crown, and Charlotte's now eldest-surviving son Ernest, who claimed the jewels by right of being the most senior male member of the House of Hanover. The dispute would not be resolved in Ernest's lifetime. Eventually in 1858, over twenty years after the death of WilliamIV and nearly forty years after Charlotte's death, the matter was decided in favour of Ernest's son George, upon which Victoria had the jewels given into the custody of the Hanoverian ambassador. [55]

Margarita de Castro e Souza herself descended from King Alfonso III of Portugal and his concubine, Madragana, a Moor that Alfonso III took as his lover after conquering the town of Faro in southern Portugal. Queen Charlotte was also a patron of the arts and had a soft spot for German composers like Handel and Johann Sebastian Bach. The queen’s music-master was Johann Christian Bach, the eleventh son of the great composer. She is also credited with the discovery of another young artist, an eight-year-old Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, whom she welcomed into the palace during his family’s visit to England from 1764 to 1765. It’s no secret that European royals, including those who ruled over Great Britain and especially those in the 18th century and earlier, attempted to protect their royal “purity” by only marrying other royals. Which is why Queen Charlotte’s ancestry has piqued so much interest.Painting by Benjamin West, whole length, her thirteen children behind her. Royal Collection (Sir Oliver Millar, The Later Georgian Pictures in the Collection of Her Majesty The Queen, I, 1969, no.1139, pl.109; H. von Erffa & A. Staley, The Paintings of Benjamin West, 1986, no.556). Exhibited RA 1780 (130). A reduced version with the Historical Society, Pennsylvania (H. von Erffa & A. Staley, The Paintings of Benjamin West, 1986, no.557).