Obviously I adore the 2005 Dennis Creffield portraits of Nelson which adorn this site, but of all the portraits Nelson physically sat for, I love this one by Friedrich Heinrich Fuger. Nelson posed for it in Vienna in 1800. It’s said to be one of the best likenesses. It is noteworthy in that he is dressed smart/casual, like a weather presenter on Countryfile or a teacher on a school trip. There are no other portraits of Nelson in civilian clothing. This picture often gets remodelled to have him cloaked in medals and generally looking like a caricature of a naval hero. Such is Nelson’s lot.
‘That foolish little fellow has sat to every painter in London,’ Lord St Vincent, a contemporary, sneered. He wasn’t far wrong, though. Of the portraits he sat for, Nelson’s favourite was by Simon de Koster, painted not long after Fuger’s. It was, he said, ‘the most like me’. His mistress, Emma Hamilton – herself no stranger to being depicted in oils – thought the same, keeping a miniature of it in a locket. Here is the picture:
Less flattering, I might suggest. But perhaps even more accurate. In both Fuger’s and de Koster’s portraits, Horatio Nelson looks like he is from Norfolk (being from Norfolk myself, I know the type). It’s the protruding eyes and angular nose. The romantic in me half fancies imagining Nelson turning his head to the left, face on, and speaking to the artist in his unmistakable local accent:
‘Hurry you up, boy.’
Which is your favourite of the two?
Nelson The Sailor 