HMS Henrietta (Charles II's Yacht) Racing to Windward under ...

Hammer

£28,000

HMS Henrietta (Charles II's Yacht) Racing to Windward under a Foresail in a Strong to Gale Force Wind (the ship belonging to Charles II). Attributed to William van de Velde The Younger (1633 - 1707). Oil on canvas. 

Willem van de Velde (1633-1707) was the leading Dutch marine painter of the later 17th Century. Son of Willem van de Velde the Elder, also a painter of sea-pieces, the younger was instructed by his father and afterwards by Simon de Vlieger, a marine painter of repute at the time, and had achieved great celebrity by his art before he came to London. By 1673 Van de Velde the Younger had moved to England, where he was engaged by Charles II at a salary of £100, to aid his father in “taking and making draughts of sea-fights”, his part of the work being to reproduce in colour the drawings of the elder Van de Velde. Willem the younger was also patronised by the Duke of York and various other members of nobility. He died in London on 6th April 1707 and was buried at St James’ Church, Piccadilly where a memorial to him and his father lies.

Many of Van de Velde’s works represent views off the coast. His paintings are notable by the delicate, spirited and finished hand. They are also correct in the drawing of the vessels and their rigging, a rare attribute of marine paintings at the time. Van de Velde is successful in his renderings of the sea, whether in calm or storm. His ships are portrayed with almost photographic accuracy and are the most precise guides available to the appearance of 17th Century ships.

His later paintings shaped the development of seascape painting in England in the 18th Century.

The ship depicted in our painting is believed to be HMS Henrietta, one of Charles II’s pleasure yachts used for racing but with the capability of being used as a war ship if necessary.

HMS Henrietta 1679:

In J David Davies, ‘Kings of the Sea: Charles II, James II and the Royal Navy’, Seaforth Publishing, Pen & Sword Books, 2017, p.84, Davies reports:

“The yachts’ exteriors were also elaborately decorated, with a profusion of sculptures and gilding.”

Contemporary models, such as that of the Henrietta Yacht of 1679, on display in the Portland Collection at Welbeck Abbey, reveal beautiful, sleek craft, gloriously gilded; on the Henrietta, a small ‘well deck’ of sorts divided the great cabin into two, providing a semi-enclosed space in which the monarch could take the air upon a damask-clad throne. Unsurprisingly, none of this came cheap.

Provenance: 

• Collection of Sir Richard Cotterell Bt, Garnons, Hereford


• Sotheby’s, London, 27 November 1957, lot 47 (as Van der Velde)


• Collection William Drown, London


• Spink & Son, London


• Alfred Brod Gallery, London


• Collection R.P. Schweder, London


• Chaucer and Van Dam Galleries, London


• Collection of a prominent family, the Netherlands