O Brunsviquense Negro

Millais built this around a real regiment and a real night. The Black Brunswickers were a German volunteer corps who fought Napoleon, known for their all-black uniforms with a skull on the cap, and they were cut to pieces in the Waterloo campaign of 1815. Here one of them is leaving for the front while his sweetheart, in a pale satin ballgown, pushes the door shut as he pulls it open. The setting nods to the famous ball in Brussels the night before the fighting, when officers left the dancing to go straight to battle. Millais made the most of the contrast he was after, the dead black broadcloth against the shining white dress. The young woman was modeled by Kate, a daughter of Charles Dickens.