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People and Society / Aristocracy

Reference URL

John Alexander

Lord Lewis Gordon, about 1724 - 1754 1738

On Display PORTRAIT GALLERY

Scottish Art

Lord Lewis followed the example of his father by actively supporting the Jacobite cause. In October 1745 he abandoned his career in the Royal Navy and swore allegiance to Prince Charles Edward Stuart. He was appointed lord lieutenant of Aberdeen and Banffshire, with orders to raise another Jacobite army in the north. When the main army headed south to England in November, Lord Lewis remained in Scotland where he recruited, with difficulty, a regiment and defeated government troops at Inverurie on 23 December 1745. After the Battle of Culloden, Lord Lewis escaped to France. He became increasingly mentally unstable and died in exile in Montreuil, not yet thirty.

Details

Acc. No. PG 3325
Medium Oil on canvas
Size 76.20 x 63.50 cm
Credit Purchased 2002

John Alexander (Scottish, 1686 - about 1766)

John Alexander, son of an Aberdeen doctor, was the great-grandson of George Jamesone, the most famous Scottish painter of the seventeenth century. After some time in London, Alexander travelled to Italy in 1711 where he studied under Giuseppe Chiari and received commissions from the Stuart court in exile. When he returned to Scotland in 1720 he worked for the Duke of Gordon, a Catholic and a staunch Jacobite, and produced his most ambitious work, a ceiling painting for Gordon Castle. Most of his clients were from the north-east of Scotland and many were Jacobites. He took up arms for Prince Charles in the 1745 Rising and became a fugitive after Culloden but was back in Edinburgh working openly by 1748.

Glossary Open

1745 Rising

An attempt by followers of Prince Charles Edward Stuart (or 'Bonnie Prince Charlie') to reclaim the British throne for the Stuart dynasty. The Prince landed in the Outer Hebrides from France in July 1745. With the support of many Highland chiefs he gathered an army and marched south. The rebels had significant victories against the Hanoverian troops and reached as far as Derby. There they turned back, unsure of their ability to take London, and were pursued by government forces. The final battle was held at Culloden in 1746 where Bonnie Prince Charlie was decisively beaten and hopes of a Jacobite restoration were dashed.

Battle of Culloden

A battle fought on Culloden Moor near Inverness in 1746 between supporters of the exiled House of Stuart - led by the Young Pretender, Prince Charles Edward Stuart - and government troops led by the Duke of Cumberland. The government victory effectively brought the 1745 Jacobite Rebellion to an end and resulted in a repression of Highland culture as punishment.

Commission

When an individual or organisation employs an artist to execute a particular project, the process and the resulting work are termed a `commission?.

Jacobite

Jacobitism was a movement to restore the descendants of the Stuart King James VII and II to the British throne. The first claimant, Prince James Francis Edward (known as 'the Old Pretender') was exiled first in France, then Italy, from where he planned unsuccessful attempts to claim the throne. His son Prince Charles Edward (known as 'Bonnie Prince Charlie' or 'the Young Pretender') famously invaded Britain in 1745, but after some military successes was finally defeated at Culloden in 1746.

The Stuarts (The Stewarts)

The Stewarts / Stuarts were a Scottish royal dynasty that began with Robert II in the late fourteenth century. In 1603, with the Union of the Crowns of Scotland and England, James VI became James I of England. The Stuart reign saw a brief interruption with the republican Commonwealth due to the English Civil War, which followed Charles I?s execution in 1649, but it was restored in 1660 with Charles II as king. After the 1707 Acts of Union, the Stuarts became the heads of state of the newly created Great Britain. However, with childless Queen Anne?s death in 1714 the crown passed to the House of Hanover. The variant in spelling, from Stewart to Stuart, was due to Mary, Queen of Scots adopting the latter, French spelling, when she lived in France. This became the standard for future generations.

1745 Rising, Battle of Culloden, Commission, Jacobite, The Stuarts (The Stewarts)