Marble bust by Peter Turnerelli, head covered, a medallion of the King at her breast. Leeds City Art Gallery (T. Friedman, Leeds Arts Calendar, 75, 1974, pp.12-17; M. Levey, A Royal Subject, Portraits of Queen Charlotte, National Gallery, 1977, p 23). The Literary Gazette announced the completion of the bust a week after the Queen's death, stating that sittings had begun in 1809 and that the Queen had 'actually wrought a part of it'. Lawrence painted Queen Charlotte in Windsor Castle, possibly at the suggestion of one of her ladies-in-waiting, Lady Cremorne, who Lawrence had portrayed the previous year (Tate, London). The Queen was troubled by her husband’s protracted mental illness and by political events unfolding in France and was in no mood to sit for the young painter. The sitting on 28 September was probably the only one she gave him. Painting by Allan Ramsay, a domesticated whole length with her two eldest sons. Royal Collection (Sir Oliver Millar, The Later Georgian Pictures in the Collection of Her Majesty The Queen, I, 1969, no.998, pl.3; A. Smart ed. J. Ingamells, Allan Ramsay, a complete catalogue of his Paintings, 1999, no.87). Versions are at Badminton, Lancaster House (GAC 2555/2), and in the Museum of Art, Baltimore. For the distribution of versions paired with Gainsborough’s portrait of the King, see George III. Of the Queen alone there are versions in the Royal Collection by William Hopkins, attributed to Gainsborough Dupont (see also c.1794 below), and two reduced copies (Sir Oliver Millar, The Later Georgian Pictures in the Collection of Her Majesty The Queen, I, 1969, nos.809-12), together with related miniatures attributed to J. H. Hurter and Richard Collins (R. J. B. Walker, The eighteenth and early nineteenth century Miniatures in the Collection of Her Majesty The Queen, 1992, nos.242, 326); a miniature copy by Hurter is in the Gilbert Collection (illus. S. Coffin & B. Hofstetter, The Gilbert Collection, Portrait Miniatures in Enamel, 2000, no.30). A half-length copy is at Penshurst, and a derivation at Powis Castle. Miniature by Richard Cosway, bust length. Royal Collection (R. J. B. Walker, The eighteenth and early nineteenth century Miniatures in the Collection of Her Majesty The Queen, 1992, no.174).

Drawing by Henry Edridge, whole-length seated. Royal Collection, where there is also a duplicate dated 1804 (A. P. Oppé, English Drawings, Stuart and Georgian periods, in the Collection of His Majesty the King at Windsor Castle, 1950, nos.198-99, pl.10). A half-length miniature copy attributed to John Hopkins in the Royal Collection (R. J. B. Walker, The eighteenth and early nineteenth century Miniatures in the Collection of Her Majesty The Queen, 1992, no.833); another by Paul Fischer, dated 1823, sold Sotheby’s, 10 June 1993, lot 173, from Stanton Harcourt.Her surroundings include some pieces of furniture, which appears to be her velvet-lined coronation chair behind her where the trailing train from her robe is partly draped over. Although the queen dutifully carried out her obligation to bear heirs to the royal throne, being constantly pregnant for almost 20 years of her life did take its toll. She kept mum about her feelings in public but shared them privately with her closest confidants. Wikimedia Commons Some historians believe that certain artists whitewashed their portraits of Queen Charlotte to comply with beauty standards of the time. Medal attributed to P. Kempson celebrating the Queen’s visit to Bath (L. Brown, A Catalogue of British Historical Medals 1760-1960: The Accession of George III to the Death of William IV, 1980, no.934).

When the King had his first, temporary, bout of mental illness in 1765, her mother-in-law and Lord Bute kept Charlotte unaware of the situation. The Regency Bill of 1765 stated that if the King should become permanently unable to rule, Charlotte was to become regent. Her mother-in-law and Lord Bute had unsuccessfully opposed this arrangement, but as the King's illness of 1765 was temporary, Charlotte was aware neither of it, nor of the Regency Bill. [6] The hanging of the whole sequence of portraits at the Royal Academy in 1783 concerned Gainsborough considerably. On the eve of the exhibition he sent a letter to the Hanging Committee insisting that the portraits should not be hung ‘above the line along with full-lengths’ and said if this happened ‘he never more, whilst he breathes, will send another Picture to the Exhibition’. The queen died in the presence of her eldest son, the Prince Regent, who was holding her hand as she sat in an armchair at the family's country retreat, Dutch House in Surrey (now known as Kew Palace). [50] She was buried at St George's Chapel, Windsor Castle. [51] Her husband died just over a year later. She is the longest-serving female consort and second-longest-serving consort in British history (after Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh), having served as such from her marriage (on 8 September 1761) to her death (17 November 1818), a total of 57 years and 70 days. [52]

Queen Charlotte was also a patron of the arts and had a soft spot for German composers like Handel and Johann Sebastian Bach. The queen’s music-master was Johann Christian Bach, the eleventh son of the great composer. She is also credited with the discovery of another young artist, an eight-year-old Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, whom she welcomed into the palace during his family’s visit to England from 1764 to 1765.