Summary

Sculpture, marble; Portrait bust of Robert Banks Jenkinson, 2nd Earl of Liverpool (1770-1828); attributed to Francis Hardenberg (fl. 1789, died 1852), after Joseph Nollekens (1737-1823); London, c. 1820-30. Robert Banks Jenkinson, later 2nd Earl of Liverpool (1770-1828), was a politician who became one of Britain’s longest-serving Prime Ministers, in post from 1812 to 1827. He had a close relationship with the Hervey family, in 1795 marrying Lady Louisa Hervey (1770-1821), the sister of the future 5th Earl and 1st Marquess of Bristol, who served under Jenkinson for a short period as a junior minister in the Foreign Office. Much later, in 1826, Lord Liverpool arranged for Lord Bristol to be advanced from Earl to Marquess. As well as a portrait of Lord Liverpool by Sir Thomas Lawrence, there are at Ickworth three versions, two in marble and one in plaster, of the marble portrait bust of Lord Liverpool made by the sculptor Joseph Nollekens in 1816, a remarkably vivid image of this impressive individual. This marble version is unsigned but was probably made by the sculptor Francis Hardenberg, who signed the other marble version.

Full description

A portrait bust in marble, attributed to Francis Hardenberg, after Joseph Nollekens (17327-1823) depicting Robert Banks Jenkinson, 2nd Earl of Liverpool (1770-1828). The sitter is shown with his head turned sharply to his left, wearing a loose toga-like drape, with an extra swag thrown over the left shoulder. Mounted on a turned marble socle. Robert Banks Jenkinson, later 2nd Earl of Liverpool, lost his mother when he was just one month old, so in his early years he was brought up by his paternal grandmother. Through his mother’s Anglo-Indian family Jenkinson had some Indian ancestry. After school at Charterhouse he went in 1787 to Christchurch Oxford where, like Frederick William Hervey, later 5th Earl and 1st Marquess of Bristol, he developed a close friendship with another future Prime Minister, George Canning (1770-1827). Jenkinson entered Parliament in 1790, serving as an M.P. until 1803, when he as asked to move to the Lords. His father Charles Jenkinson had been created 1st Earl of Liverpool in 1796, Robert Jenkinson taking the courtesy title Lord Hawkesbury, which he kept until he succeeded his father in 1808, as the 2nd Earl of Liverpool. During these years the relationship between Jenkinson and the Hervey family grew stronger when in 1795, despite the strong opposition of his father (who disapproved of the well-known eccentricities of the Herveys, as well as the family’s traditional Whig sympathies) he married Lady Louisa Theodosia Hervey (1767-1821), youngest daughter of the 4th Earl of Bristol and the sister of the future 5th Earl, who at this time was also in Parliament and who served as an Under-Secretary of State in the Foreign Office, during Lord Hawkesbury’s term as Foreign Secretary, between 1801 and 1804. Hawkesbury, from 1808 Lord Liverpool, subsequently served as Home Secretary from 1804 until 1809 when he was appointed Secretary of State for War. In 1812 he became Prime Minister, his nearly fifteen subsequent years of service until his retirement in 1827 making him one of the longest-serving British premiers. Lord Liverpool was widely criticized as dull and timid in the decades after his death, Benjamin Disraeli famously referring to him as an “Arch-mediocrity” in his 1844 novel ‘Coningsby’. But in more recent years he has come to be admired for his intelligent leadership of the nation during his term as Prime Minister. Lord Liverpool’s interest in and deep knowledge of economics and foreign affairs, as well as his innate moderation and genuine desire to seek consensus where possible, helped him to steer the country on the whole wisely through some of its most difficult times, which included the latter years and aftermath of the economically crippling years of warfare against France, as well as growing demands for social reform in the years following Waterloo. His policies, bolstered by his understanding of economics and his free-trade principles, led to an economic boom in Britain by the early 1820s. Lord Liverpool was also a devout Christian with a genuine concern for the needs of the poorer in society. Among Liverpool’s other achievements were his roles in the establishment of today’s Royal National Lifeboat Institution and the founding of the National Gallery in 1824. Harriet Arbuthnot (1793-1834), whose journals for the years 1820-32 give such a vivid picture of a tumultuous decade (and for most of which time the Earl of Liverpool was Prime Minister), gave a fine summary of Lord Liverpool’s achievement: ‘Lord Liverpool has a disagreeable, cold manner & a most querulous, irritable temper, which render it a difficult & an unpleasant task to act in public life with him; but he is a most upright, honest, excellent man, conscientiously devoted to the service & to the real good of his country. He has held the reins of government in times of unexampled difficulty, has been upheld by the country from a perfect conviction of his probity as well as his political talents, & has guided the helm in a way to justify this well-merited confidence.’ (17th September 1821; Arbuthnot 1850, I, p. 121). The death of Lord Liverpool’s wife Louisa in 1821 affected him deeply, but he maintained close relations with her brother Frederick, who was created 1st Marquess of Bristol in 1826 on Liverpool's recommendation. The importance of Lord Liverpool in the professional and personal lives of the Hervey family at this time is reflected in the presence at Ickworth of no fewer than three versions of his portrait bust by Joseph Nollekens, as well as his portrait painted by Sir Thomas Lawrence (NT 851752). Sir Thomas Lawrence too in his several portraits evidently strove hard to catch the distinctive and strong features of Lord Liverpool. He tended to depict the sitter from the front, his most attractive angle. Harriet Arbuthnot commented on the portrait that Lawrence painted for the King in around 1820 (Waterloo Chamber, Windsor Castle, RCIN 404930): ‘It is impossible to conceive anything more exquisitely like or where the character and the manière d’être of the individual is more perfectly caught. It has exactly his untidy look and slouching way of standing; it has, too, all the profound and penetrating expression which marks this distinguished statesman.’ (17th September 1821; Arbuthnot 1950: I, p. 121). The prime version of Nollekens’ bust is in the Royal Collection (RCIN 31318) and is signed and dated 1816, making it one of the very last portraits that the sculptor made (Roscoe 2009, p. 910, no. 342; Marsden 2025, II, pp. 463-64, no. 211). It was exhibited at the Royal Academy summer exhibition for 1816 (no. 951). The portrait shows the sitter with his head turned sharply to his left, bringing to the viewer’s attention the subject’s large nose, heavy forehead and generally burly aspect. Joseph Nollekens was born into a family of artists from Antwerp that had settled in London. As a young man, he was apprenticed to Peter Scheemakers (1691-1781) before travelling to Rome, where he lived for some ten years from 1760. On his return to Britain, Nollekens became one of the most successful sculptors of the day, making many monuments, but also large numbers of portraits. The finest portrait sculptor working in Britain in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, Nollekens had a remarkable ability to create lively likenesses in which the characters of the subject are strongly expressed, a quality that is easily apparent in his portrait of the Earl of Liverpool. The sculptor seems in this portrait to have captured Lord’s Liverpool latent irritation and quickness of temper, as well as his intelligence and direct honesty. The three versions of the bust at Ickworth are all copies after Nollekens’ original marble. The other marble version (NT 852224.1) is a highly competent and accurate replica of Nollekens’ original marble, even to the form of the socle, and is signed by Francis Hardenberg, a little-known modeller and sculptor who is thought to have been born German. He is first recorded working as a modeller in china factories in Shropshire and Derby, but was dismissed for idleness. He subsequently moved to London, where he seems to have run his business from his address in Mount Street, just off Grosvenor Square. He is recorded making small marble ornaments, supplying statues in plaster but also dealing in china. There is at Sheringham a group of five signed plaster busts with extraordinarily wide-ranging subjects, from the god Apollo to Shakespeare to William Pitt (NT 800415.1-5). The main difference between Nollekens’ original bust and Hardenberg’s copy is the quite different modelling of the back. The back is so similar on this unsigned marble version at Ickworth that it too is very likely to be the work of the same sculptor. The third version, also unsigned and in plaster (NT 852224.2), could also have been made by Hardenberg, who regularly worked in the material. This version of the bust of Lord Liverpool is one of four sculpted portraits of contemporary politicians that have been on display in the Library since 1830, when Bantings supplied scagliola columns for them. The others depict George Canning (NT 852212), Charlerrs James Fox (NT 852213) and William Pitt the Younger (NT 852214). All have until recently been believed to be autograph works by Joseph Nollekens. Jeremy Warren July 2025