Sir Hugh Palliser (1722–1796), Governor of Greenwich Hospital

Sir Hugh Palliser, Governor of Greenwich Hospital, was a controversial naval officer best known for his role in the inconclusive Battle of Ushant in 1778 and his subsequent public dispute with Admiral Keppel, which ended in a court-martial that became a major political scandal. As Governor of Greenwich Hospital—the sailors' retirement home and naval monument—Palliser occupied one of the most prestigious institutional positions in the naval establishment. Dance's portrait captures the admiral in formal dress appropriate to institutional office, the controversy of his Keppel episode having somewhat overshadowed an otherwise distinguished naval career stretching back to the Seven Years' War.

Dance renders the naval officer in formal dress with the composed authority expected of institutional portraiture, the dark costume against a neutral ground creating the sober tone appropriate to a Greenwich Hospital governor.