Adriaen Hannemann c.1601-1671

Lord Newborough, Bodfean Hall, Pwllheli, Carnarvonshire;

By descent to Mrs E. Broughton Adderley

David Piper, Catalogue of the Seventeenth Century Portraits in the National Gallery (1625-1714), 1963, p.71;

O. ter Kuile, Adriaen Hannemann, 1976, p.86, no.34a, illus. no.50;

Robin Gibson, Catalogue of Portraits in the Collection of the Earl of Clarendon, 1977, p.27

Engraved:

Mezzotint, After Thomas Johnson (O'Donoghue, Vol.I, 1908, p.436, no.8), as after Gerard Soest;

B. Picart, 1724;

J.Fittler (O'Donoghue, no.10);

W.P. Benoist (O'Donoghue, no.11 & 12)

Of the three principal versions of this portrait, Ter Kuile in his catalogue raisonne considered this example 'the best', and reinforced the earlier judgement of David Piper that it was the only one of those portraits that should be considered the original.  It was painted during Hyde's exile in the Netherlands, most probably c.1655, when it is known that Anne Hyde, the sitter's daughter, was painted by the artist.  Hannemann, a former pupil of Sir Anthony van Dyck, was much patronised by the Royalist court in exile at The Hague.  In 1649, he had painted the young King Charles II, and was commissioned by Hyde at about the date of the present portrait, to paint the King's sister, Mary Princess of Orange (Clarendon Collection). 

The career of Edward Hyde, Earl of Clarendon was, from its inception, inextricably linked with the fortunes of his two royal masters, Charles I and Charles II.  After an education at Magdalene Hall, Oxford and the Middle Temple, he entered Parliament for Wooton Basset in the Short and Saltash in the Long Parliaments of 1640, amid the ferment of opposition to the King's policies.  As an aspiring barrister, he was concerned with abuses of the law during the eleven years of the Personal Rule of Charles I and was involved in drawing up the articles to impeach the Earl of Strafford.  By nature, however, he was no radical and both his friendship with Archbishop Laud, and his membership of the coterie that met at Lord Falkland's house at Great Tew in Oxfordshire, served to sever any links with the popular party.  By 1641, Hyde was the leader of the Royalist party in the Commons, and was responsible for drafting the King's answer to the Grand Remonstrance. 

In 1642 he joined the King, and in 1643 he was appointed Chancellor of the Exchequer.  Two years later he represented the King in the unsuccessful negotiations at Uxbridge in January.  Hyde was then appointed head of the Prince of Wales's Council in the West Country, but the collapse of the Royal cause forced him to flee to Jersey in the following year.  There he began The History of the Rebellion, the work that ensured his reputation as a historian, as well as transmitting the royalist cause to posterity.

In 1648, he joined the Prince of Wales at the Hague, and in 1651 he was recognised as Charles II's principal counsellor.  His advice to the King, during the period of exile, establishes him as the architect of the Restoration, and his strategy of eschewing military action in favour of patience and the fostering of favourable opinion in England, ensured that in 1660 the King was received as a returning sovereign, rather than an invader.  As a reward for these services, he was appointed Chancellor and Chief Minister, and in 1661 was created Earl of Clarendon.  In addition, in 1663, he was among eight of the King's favourites who received a charter granting them the vast lands south of Virginia, an expanse covering much of what is now the southern United States, then known as Carolina.  The name of Clarendon, North Carolina commemorates this venture.

However, his success and his censure of the unruly court gave impetus to his enemies.  He was blamed for the sale of Dunkirk to the French in 1662, and for the failures of the Second Dutch War.  In addition, the marriage of his daughter Anne to the Duke of York, and the great house that he built on Piccadilly, all seemed to suggest a subject with too great an ambition.  In 1667 he was impeached and fled to France, where he completed his history.  Parliament passed an Act of Banishment for life, which against his hopes was never repealed.  His legacy, however, remains prodigious: the six-volume History of the Rebellion, from its combination of personal recollection and the use of primary sources remains an invaluable text.  Furthermore, his two granddaughters Mary and Anne, the children of the Duke and Duchess of York, both became Queen.