Giorgio III (1738-1820)

Gainsborough painted the king around 1781, and George III chose to be shown almost as a country gentleman. He wears the plain blue-and-red Windsor uniform he had designed himself, one hand pointing to the Garter star on his chest. There is little of the usual royal thunder here. Gainsborough and the king got on well, and this portrait, with a companion piece of Queen Charlotte, went on show at the Royal Academy in 1781. These were hard years for the crown. As the picture hung in London, British forces were losing the war in America, and within two years the colonies would be gone. The pair of portraits eventually moved to Windsor Castle, where they hang today.