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| - The paintings were commissioned from Lely by James, Duke of York, brother of King Charles II, in late 1665. James had commanded the English fleet against the Dutch at the Battle of Lowestoft on 13 June 1665, and the portraits were intended to commemorate those who had served under him as junior flag officers and captains of some of the ships. Lely, Principal Painter to King Charles II, was working on the series known as the 'Windsor Beauties' at the time for James's wife, Anne Hyde, Duchess of York. The full set consists of thirteen portraits of admirals and senior officers, or 'Flaggmen' as they were known at the time.
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abstract
| - The paintings were commissioned from Lely by James, Duke of York, brother of King Charles II, in late 1665. James had commanded the English fleet against the Dutch at the Battle of Lowestoft on 13 June 1665, and the portraits were intended to commemorate those who had served under him as junior flag officers and captains of some of the ships. Lely, Principal Painter to King Charles II, was working on the series known as the 'Windsor Beauties' at the time for James's wife, Anne Hyde, Duchess of York. The full set consists of thirteen portraits of admirals and senior officers, or 'Flaggmen' as they were known at the time. Diarist and naval administrator Samuel Pepys visited Lely's studio on 18 April 1666, writing I to Mr. Lilly's , the painter; and there saw the heads, some finished and all begun, of the Flaggmen in the late great fight with the Duke of Yorke against the Dutch. The Duke of Yorke hath them done to hang in his chamber, and very finely they are done indeed. He noted that work had begun on all but three portraits, those of the Earl of Sandwich, Sir Jeremiah Smith and Sir William Penn, had yet to be started. The absence of Lawson's portrait in Pepys's list may indicate that this was a later addition to the original commission, Lawson having died on 25 June 1665 of a wound he received in the battle. Since Lawson was already dead and the portrait had not been begun by 1666, it was possibly a posthumous addition to the set. To create unity and emphasise the portraits as being part of a group, Lely painted them in an identical format, all three-quarter length, and on canvases measuring roughly by .
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