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The detail on the painting is superb. The
uniforms are near-perfect, and the details of the fashions in the
crowd are fantastic. It is a very active picture, with all of the
different Troops, the artillery detachment firing (causing one lady
in the crowd to cover her ears), the Surgeons (with their black
plumes) watching, children climbing the tree to the left, someone's
horse bolting in the background, the sail of a barge going up the
Severn, and the band playing in the only record or depiction that
we have of them before the 1890's. As a Regimental and Social History
document, it is unsurpassable.
Traditionally this painting was believed to have been painted in
1842. This date has been queried several times in the last 10 years,
and only in the last month have we been able to confirm that it
is indeed wrong. Extensive research has produced much new information
and enabled us to say with 100% assurance that the review was that
of the 29th September, 1838, and that this work was created over
the following months and completed in the spring of 1839.
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