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.

The Duchess of Kent, Queen Victoria's mother, was 70 years old when this portrait was painted and she wrote in her diary 'It is a great penitence for me to sit for my picture, but it is for Victoria. It made me very tired.'

Signed and dated: Fr Winterhalter / London 1857.