(Antwerp 1599–1641 London)
Henry Jermyn, the future Lord Jermyn and Earl of St. Albans (1604–1684), oil on canvas, 77.1 x 55.9 cm, framed

Provenance: Probably Horace Walpole, Strawberry Hill (1784); Sale of the Horace Walpole Collection, Strawberry Hill sale, 18 May 1842, lot 64: Collection of Thomas Jones (1788–1848), Hinton House; Hinton House sale (1848); Collection of. Mary Day; Edward Talbot Day Jones (1837–1911); English Private Collection.

Literature: Horace Walpole: A Description of the Villa … at Strawberry Hill (Strawberry Hill, 1784): Henry Jermyn, Earl of Saint Alban’s, favourite, and, as Sir John Reresby says, second husband of Queen Henrietta Maria (…I believe by old Stone). Inventory of all the Household … including Paintings at Hinton Charterhouse, the Property of the late Thomas Jones made August 23rd-28th 1848 by English and Sons, Bath referred to as: Portrait of Lord Guildford, with moustache, black vest and lace collar (as Anthony Van Dyck); Sir Oliver Millar: Van Dyck – A Complete Catalogue of the Paintings, Newhaven & London 2004, p. 641, No IV A35 (with an endorsement of the traditional attribution; Miller considers the work to be a variant after the lost full-length portrait in Rushbrooke Hall).

As the portrait of one of the most popular supporters of Charles I (and allegedly the widowed queen’s second husband), this painting is an important document both historically and art historically. In 1633, the King banished Jermyn to France because of a love affair, but the latter returned to England that same year as one of the Queen’s favourites. In 1639 he was appointed Master of the Horses to the Queen’s court. During the Commonwealth, he and the Queen shared the same exile. His loyalty was rewarded during the Restoration, when he was appointed Lord Chamberlain and awarded the Order of the Garter. Our painting very probably figured in the famous collection of the writer and politician Horace Walpole (1717–1797) at the latter’s Gothic Revival country estate of Strawberry Hill. In 1784 the work appeared in a watercolour by E. Edwards illustrating the picture gallery of Strawberry Hill. In the early 19th Century, a mezzotint engraving was done after the present painting. In 2004 Millar endorsed the traditional attribution, identifying the present painting as a variant based on a lost full-length portrait.