The 3rd Duke of Richmond with the Charlton Hunt

The 3rd Duke of Richmond, Charles Lennox, was an important Whig politician and military administrator, and his estate at Goodwood in Sussex maintained one of the finest racing stables in England. Stubbs painted for the Richmond family on more than one occasion, and this hunting scene — showing the Duke with the Charlton Hunt, one of England's oldest established foxhunting packs — positions the patron as the commanding figure at the centre of a social and sporting institution. Hunt portraits of this type were significant commissions: they documented both the sitter's authority and the organisational prestige of the hunt itself. The Charlton Hunt, based on the South Downs, attracted aristocratic membership from across southern England. Stubbs's ability to handle multiple horses and figures across a wide format made him the natural choice for such ensemble sporting scenes. The year recorded as 1922 in metadata is an obvious error — the work dates from the 1760s based on stylistic and biographical evidence.

Stubbs arranges the hunting party across a horizontal format typical of his multi-figure equestrian portraits. Each horse is given individual characterisation through coat colour and posture. The landscape background — rolling downland — is kept low and expansive, functioning as a stage rather than a specific topographic record.