Friedrich Rehberg (1758-1835)

Lady Hamilton mourning the death of Lord Nelson

 

Watercolor

c. 1805

Monogrammed lower left 15,5 x 21 cm

 

The son of a respected civil servant, Friedrich Christian Rehberg was the younger brother of August Wilhelm Rehberg, a famous politician, writer and adviser to the Court of Hanover. His sister, Caroline Rehberg, was also an artist.

 

He first studied at the Dresden Academy, where he was taught by Giovanni Battista Casanova, brother of the famous Giacomo, before leaving for Rome on 24 November 1777 to study with the painter Anton Raphael Mengs, one of the leading figures of Neoclassicism in Europe.

 

In 1791, he travelled to Naples where he regularly frequented the salon of the British ambassador Sir William Hamilton. He met the ambassador’s wife Emma, famous for her beauty and acting talents: she used her theatrical skills to adopt attitudes inspired by classical statuary.

 

Twelve of these poses were drawn by Rehberg: these were later engraved by Tommaso Piroli (1754-1824) and published in Rome in 1794 under the title Lady Hamilton’s Attitudes: Twelve Drawings Faithfully Copied from Nature at Naples, and, with Permission, Dedicated to the Right Honorable Sir William Hamilton.

 

Lady Hamilton

Emma Lyon, Lady Hamilton, was born in Great Neaston (Cheshire) around 1761 and died in Calais on 15 January 1815. Of very humble origins, she worked as a chambermaid before becoming the mistress of the parliamentarian Charles Greville, who introduced her to the painter George Romney. She modelled for him, as well as for Reynolds, Lawrence and Vigée-Lebrun. In 1786, she became the mistress of Sir William Hamilton, ambassador to Naples.

 

Emma was witty, extremely beautiful and an admirable singer. She played a considerable role at the court of Naples, where her salon, made up of artists, poets and musicians, soon became famous throughout Europe. In May 1791, she married the ambassador in London and, on her return to Italy, she became the friend and confidante of Maria Carolina of Naples: the English government took advantage of this intimacy. During a visit to Naples in 1793, Nelson made Lady Hamilton’s acquaintance; after the Battle of Aboukir (1798), he became her lover in full view of everyone. He took her and her husband on board when Championnet threatened the kingdom of Naples, brought them back from Palermo in 1800, and travelled with them to Vienna, Dresden, Hamburg and England.

 

Hamilton’s death (1803) left Emma in a very precarious position. She was burdened with debts and tried in vain, with Nelson’s support, to obtain a pension from either Maria Carolina or the British government as a reward for her diplomatic services. Nelson’s death plunged her completely into poverty; arrested for insolvency in 1843, she was locked up in King’s Bench prison, where she remained for a year, before taking refuge in Calais, where she died.

 

There are many portraits of Lady Hamilton: the most remarkable are those by Romney and Vigée-Lebrun. Her Memoirs (London, 1815) and Nelson’s Letters to Lady Hamilton (London, 1814, 2 vols. in-8) have been published. Alexandre Dumas’s novel La Favorite is based on her Memoirs.