He married, 25 April 1748, Lady Elizabeth Yorke (1725 - 60),
daughter of 1st Earl of Hardwicke.
Died aged 35.
Anson became the second Englishman after Sir Francis Drake to circumnavigate the world on a voyage against Spanish interests in the Pacific in 1740 - 44 and in 1743 became a wealthy man as a result of capturing the Spanish treasure ship 'Nuestra Senora de Covadonga' off the Philippines.
The first stage of their journey around Cape Horn had been a military disaster with the loss of two ships and over 600 men from scurvy, cold and privation.
On 20 June 1743 Anson achieved his most notable victory,
intercepting and attacking a Manila galleon, the Nuestra Señora de Covadonga
that was sailing between Acapulco and the Philippines heavily laden with
silver. Anson captured the ship which he later sold to the Dutch, along with
1,313,843 pieces of eight and 35,682 ounces of virgin silver, then valued at
£400,000. This is the equivalent to around £35 million today, of which he was
entitled to a staggering £13,125,000.
Eventually Centurion sailed alone reached Macao in November 1742, making George Anson the first British man-of-war to visit China.
Later in command of the Channel fleet he defeated the French at the first Battle of Finisterre, 1747, after which he was raised to the peerage.
On his return in 1745, Anson was appointed Vice-Admiral of the White and joined the Whig opposition under the Duke of Bedford, 1st Lord of the Admiralty and the Earl of Sandwich. Together the three men undertook a series of reforms of the navy, including ship design and training.
By 1747 he succeeded as First Lord of the Admiralty. In 1748, he married the Hon. Elizabeth Yorke, aged 23, the eldest daughter of Philip York, Lord Hardwicke, who was then Lord Chancellor.
The Battle of Finisterre.
Samuel Scott.
YCBA.
https://collections.britishart.yale.edu/catalog/tms:1040
From - Voyage autour du monde fait dans les années 1740-44 (Voyage around the world made in the years 1740-44... in the South Sea). Published by R. Walter. Decorated with maps and intaglio figs. New edition. Amsterdam and Leipzig, Arkstèe and Merkus, 1749.
He purchased 15 St James Square, London (later Lichfield
House) as a town house in 1748. He bought Orgreave Hall in 1752 and he paid
£14,000 for the Moor Park (Herts) estate the same year and spent a further
£6,000 employing Matthew Brettingham to make alterations to the house, 1752-54
and Capability Brown to lay out the grounds in 1754-59.
"Anson is an unlikely naval hero. Unlike Nelson, he did not seek out the press or achieve dizzying victories. Instead, Anson’s greatest battles were fought in the halls of power, both within and outside the navy. He understood that the Royal Navy was an imperfect instrument in dire need of reform, but that bureaucratic changes came second to good personnel and talent management; and that the latter assures the former. By selecting officers and crown servants based on merit and potential, Anson was able to enact sweeping reforms in ship design; supply and support; pay and conditions of service; tactics, techniques and procedures; and education and training.
Every aspect of
naval administration was impacted by Anson, although his guiding hand is easier
to sense than to hold. We regularly hear that people are Defence’s greatest
asset, but few have impacted the daily lived experience as Anson did. He
introduced a standardised uniform, codified punishment and court martial
proceedings, streamlined promotion boards, and professionalised the officer
cadre."
Quoted from - https://www.rusi.org/explore-our-research/publications/commentary/trafalgar-legacy-george-anson
He died 6 June 1762 while walking in the grounds at Moor Park and was buried at St. Michael and All Angels Church, Colwich, Staffordshire.
The barony became extinct on his death; his will was proved 16 June 1762.
His wife died 1 June 1760 and was also buried at
Colwich.
....................................
The Marble Bust of George Anson.
This is dangerous territory but I would suggest that the two busts were both carved in about 1750.
an interesting feature here is the embroidery of the coat -
The plate is after Faber junior's engraving after Alan Ramsay of Admiral the Hon.
Charles Stewart (1681-1741).
'Lord Anson, Baron of Soberton in the County of Southampton
/ Vice Admiral of the Blue. // G. Bockman delineavit & fecit, 1747. // Sold
by H Overton without Newgate London.'
Image Courtesy British Museum.
Engraving by Jacobus Houbraken.
after J. Wandelaar.
line engraving.
1751.
NPG
......................
George Anson.
Engraved by and sold by James Macardell (c.1728 - 65).
after Sir Joshua Reynolds (1723 - 92).
Mezzotint.
Published 1755.
......................
George Anson.
Francis Coates (1726 - 1770).
Pastel.
c. 1750.
Shugborough.
George Anson.
Joshua Reynolds.
Sittings recorded for February 21st and 25th 1755.
Shugborough.
National Trust.
https://www.nationaltrustcollections.org.uk/object/1271068
This picture is one of a group left to Greenwich Hospital by
Admiral Sir Hugh Palliser, Governor of Greenwich Hospital, in 1796.
A three-quarter-length portrait to the right showing Anson
in flag officer’s full dress uniform, 1748–67,
In the right background are the yachts of the squadron he
commanded which brought Princess Charlotte to Britain in 1761.
.......................
Anson
Copy of a Portrait at Shugborough by William Hoare
in the Royal Collection.
A low resolution image of the Shugborough portrait is available here -
https://artuk.org/discover/artworks/admiral-sir-george-anson-16971762-baron-anson-of-soberton-132286
............................
George Anson.
Copy of a relief after James Tassie (1735 - 99).
Plaster Relief of 1894.
Image copyright National Galleries of Scotland.
https://www.nationalgalleries.org/art-and-artists/1742?search=Anson&search_set_offset=5
.jpg)
Medal commemorating the Defeat of the French fleet off Cape
Finisterre and Admiral Anson's voyage around the world. 1747
4.3 cm (diameter).
In 1760, Thomas Anson suffered a great loss, with the death of his close friend and sister-in-law, Elizabeth York, and again in 1762, with the death of his brother George.
Thomas memorialised them both by adding their
busts in the outer arches. In the central arch, Thomas added an ‘aplustre’, a
commemorative plaque. It depicts naval trophies and other attributes linked to
his brother’s illustrious life.
Stuart, James. 1762. The antiquities of Athens, v. 4, London
: Printed by J. Haberkorn.
The monument, commissioned by Thomas Anson, was built
sometime between 1748 and 1756. The outer form of the monument is a portico
featuring two doric columns. These support an entablature decorated by a frieze
comprising three metopes depicting laurel wreaths, and two containing carvings
of stone heads. One head shows a smiling bald-headed man; the other bears a
likeness to the goat-horned Greek god Pan. The entablature is topped with an
antefix using an anthemion design.
Inside the portico is a rusticated arch, which frames a relief carved by sculptor Peter Scheemakers. The relief is a copy of the Poussin painting Et in arcadia ego and shows a woman and three men, two of whom are pointing to a tomb.
After an engraving of a painting known as 'Les Bergers d'Arcadie' or 'Et in
Arcadia ego', executed c.1638/40, acquired by Louis XIV in 1685 and now in the
Musée du Louvre, Paris.
On the tomb is carved the Latin text Et in arcadia ego ("I am also in Arcadia" or "I am, even in Arcadia").
The carving displays a number of small alterations from the original painting, including the addition of an extra sarcophagus placed on top of the main tomb.
Below the relief is a stone plaque displaying a ten-letter
inscription. The inscription is broken into two lines. There are eight letters
on the first line, and two below on the second line, placed at either end of
the letters on the first line. The letters on the second line, D M, were
commonly used on Roman tombs to stand for Dis Manibus, meaning "dedicated
to the shades".
Image below showing the hands of the Shepherds appearing to merge into the inscription.
.jpg)
A Reminder of Death in the Middle of the Prosperity of Life.
Engraving after Poussin by Bernard Picart (1673 - 1733).
Rue St Jacques, au Buste de Monseigneur, Paris
Image below from the British Museum.
https://www.britishmuseum.org/collection/object/P_1874-0808-1822
For the Original painting in the Louvre see -
https://collections.louvre.fr/en/ark:/53355/cl010062528
Thomas Anson, FRS the older brother of George Anson was a British
Member of Parliament, traveller and amateur architect.
The Anson brothers were the sons of William Anson (1656–1720) and Isabella Carrier, who was sister-in-law to Thomas Parker, 1st Earl of Macclesfield.
The family estate was Shugborough Hall in Staffordshire.
Admiral George Anson, 1st Baron
Anson was his younger brother and along with their cousin, George Parker, 2nd
Earl of Macclesfield, they were taught mathematics and navigation by Isaac
Newton's friend, the mathematician William Jones, who was later to propose
Anson's membership for the Royal Society in 1730. Anson went up to St John's
College, Oxford, and later studied law at the Inner Temple.
Upon his father's death, Anson abandoned law and began the
first of many travels to the continent. In 1732 Anson and his friend the Earl
of Sandwich formed a riotous dining-club called the Society of the Dilettanti,
which also had the more serious purpose of encouraging study of Greek
architecture. In 1740 Thomas briefly joined his brother George on The
Centurion, as he and his crew began their circumnavigation of the globe. Anson
left them in order to travel to Egypt. This qualified him for the Egyptian Society
and the Divan Society, the latter being a wild drinking-club of which Lord
Dashwood and Lady Mary Wortley Montagu were avid members.
He was elected to the House of Commons for Lichfield in
1747, a seat he held until 1770.
In 1748 Anson was sent to Versailles by Lord Sandwich with
secret correspondence for the Duc de Choiseul and Madame de Pompadour.
In 1762 he succeeded to the vast fortune of Spanish treasure amassed by his brother.
This enabled him to further indulge his passion for architecture at Shugborough.
Anson died unmarried in March 1773.
The Anson
estates were passed on to his nephew, George Adams, who assumed the surname of
Anson and was ancestor of the Earls of Lichfield.
