Winterhalter was born in the Black Forest where he was encouraged to draw at school. In 1818 he went to Freiburg to study under Karl Ludwig Schüler and then moved to Munich in 1823, where he attended the Academy and studied under Josef Stieler, a fashionable portrait painter. Winterhalter was first brought to the attention of Queen Victoria by the Queen of the Belgians and subsequently painted numerous portraits at the English court from 1842 till his death. Count Alexander was the son of Count Emanuel Mensdorff-Pouilly and a cousin of Queen Victoria (his mother was the Duchess of Kent's elder sister). She called him ‘the best of them all, – he is so excellent and so kind’. He served at the courts of Coburg and Lisbon and then entered the Austrian service, winning distinction in the army and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. He became Governor of Bohemia and was made a Prince. Here Count Alexander wears the badge of the Order of the Tower and Sword of Portugal. Signed and dated: F Winterhalter / 1847. Inscribed on the back with the names of the artist and sitter and the date, February 1847