The grand procession to St. Paul's on St. George's Day 1789

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William Holland
The grand procession to St. Paul's on St. George's Day 1789
etching
image: 247 x 1461 mm; plate: 268 x 1508 mm; sheet: 294 x 1568 mm
Purchased by J. Pierpont Morgan, 1900.
Peel 2821
Published: 
London : Published by William Holland, printseller, no. 50 Oxford Street, April 29, 1789.
Provenance: 
Formerly owned by Sir Robert Peel.
Notes: 

Backed with linen.

Summary: 

A long strip design on two plates of the royal procession (left to right) to St. Paul's. On the extreme left is Temple Bar, through which the royal coach has just passed, followed by two mounted Life-Guardsmen. In the royal coach (not the glass coach actually used) sit the King and Queen; facing them is a very ugly woman. Pitt as the only postilion rides the near leader of the eight cream-coloured horses. The coachman and the three footmen standing at the back of the coach may be intended for politicians but cannot be identified. Immediately in front of the King's coach rides the 'LORD MAYOR' (William Gill), holding the City Sword, which he has just offered to the King, and in great difficulties with his horse, whose mane he grasps. One man seizes the reins, another holds the Mayor's leg. Before the City contingent of the sheriffs and four Common Councilmen rides a man on a goat with a leek in his hat, evidently Sir Watkin Lewis. Behind the cavalcade is visible here and there a row of bayonets, held at varying angles. In front of the procession, and on the extreme right, are the City Militia who guarded the route on the east of Temple Bar. They are of grotesquely unsoldierly appearance, holding their muskets with extreme awkwardness. Above the heads of the procession is a line of first-floor windows (on the north side of Fleet Street) crowded with spectators, who lean out waving their hats.

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