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Dimensions: 127 by 102 cm., 50 by 40 in.

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Provenance: By descent to the sitter's daughter, Maria Susannah, wife of Sir Thomas Henry Liddell, 6th Bt., later 1st Lord Ravensworth;
By descent in the Liddell family until sold in Lord Ravensworth's sale at Eslington Park, 6th November 1951, lot 492;
Anon. sale, Sotheby's, 10th March 1965, lot 95, bt. Wallach for £250;
Anon. sale, Sotheby's, 13th July 1988, lot 47

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Exhibited: British Institution, 1857, no.164;
Grosvenor Gallery, Works of Sir Joshua Reynolds, P.R.A., 1883, no.140

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Literature: A.Graves and W.V.Cronin, A History of the Works of Sir Joshua Reynolds, Vol.III, 1899-1901, pp.900-01;
Sir Walter Armstrong, Sir Joshua Reynolds, 1900, p.229;
Ellis K.Waterhouse, Reynolds, 1941, p.59;
Malcolm Cormack, 'The Ledgers of Sir Joshua Reynolds', Walpole Society, Vol.XLII, 1968-70, p.135;
David Mannings, Sir Joshua Reynolds, A Complete Catalogue of his Paintings, 2000, Text Volume, pp.415-16, no.1624, Plates Volume, fig.922

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Notes: The sitter was the second son of John Simpson of Newcastle-upon-Tyne, and his wife Jane, daughter and heiress of Henry Anderson of Bradley. He married Anne Clutterbuck and lived at Bradley Hall in Northumberland. Their daughter Maria Susannah married Sir Thomas Liddell in 1796.