The Family of the Grand Duke of Hesse, 1879 (oil on canvas)

Queen Victoria Eugénie, consort of Alfonso XIII, King of Spain (1887-1969) Louis, the Grand Duke of Hesse is seated, surrounded by his family. He wears a General Officer's greatcoat with the badge 'Pour La Mérite' and the Iron Cross, and holds a riding crop. His wife Alice (the Grand Duchess, Queen Victoria's second daughter) stands behind him, resting her left arm on the shoulder of Prince Ernest. Princess Elizabeth stands behind her father; Princess Alix stands on the left, leaning on the arm of the chair. The couple's eldest daughter, Princess Victoria, was pronounced 'too big' to be included in the picture. The children and their mother are in day dress. The picture was painted for Queen Victoria, who paid Von Angeli £1260 for it on 3 December 1879. It was hoped that the artist would go to Darmstadt in 1877 to begin the picture, but he was unable to escape work commitments until the following year. On 9 April 1878 Princess Alice wrote to her mother that Von Angeli had arrived and would start work at once on preparatory studies of the heads. Princess Alice died on 14 December 1878, presumably before completion of the picture, and her likeness is close to the three-quarter-length study which Von Angeli had painted earlier in the year. The picture was brought over to Osborne House on 21 January 1879, where it provided comfort for the Queen in the months following her daughter's death. To Princess Victoria of Hesse the Queen wrote: 'The dear family picture is a great delight & comfort to me & so wonderfully – splendidly painted & grouped – so very like. I think Ella's expression is just hers & Ernie's an expression he very often has.'