Sir George Warren by Sophie de Tott

A previously uncatalogued painting by Sophie de Tott, close friend and associate of Elizabeth Craven, has come onto the market in London.

It is this portrait of Sir George Warren dated 1801. 

Sir George Warren, born on 7th February 1735, was the son of Edward Warren and Elizabeth Cholmondeley. He married, firstly, Jane Revel, daughter of Thomas Revel, in May 1758 at Edinburgh, Midlothian, Scotland. He married secondly, Frances Bishopp, daughter of Sir Cecil Bishopp, 6th Bt. and Hon. Anne Boscawen, in 1764. He died on 31st August 1801, aged 66.

     He was Member of Parliament for Lancaster between 1758 and 1780 and was appointed a Knight of the Bath in 1761. He became M.P. for Beaumaris between 1780 and 1784; then once again M.P. for Lancaster between 1786 and 1796. He lived at Poynton-Hall, a Jacobean house in Cheshire.

   So this portrait was painted not long before his death, and soon after Sophie de Tott had arrived in England as a refugee from Hamburg, during the Napoleonic wars. She painted other portraits of MPs around the same time and undoubtedly the commissions were arranged to provide her with a means of earning her living.  The English government was aware of her work as a secret agent on the Continent.

   There are some curious details about the life of Sir George Warren. He was persuaded by a book written by the Rev John Watson that he was descended from the mediaeval Warenne family, and thought he had a claim to their extinct earldom. He applied to the House of Lords, which rejected his claim. The expense was considerable but luckily his first wife, Miss Jane Revel (or Revell) had brought him a fortune of £200,000, the equivalent of at least twenty million in today's currency. 

   His second wife, Frances Bishopp, daughter of the MP for Penryn, was appointed in 1761 maid of honour to Queen Charlotte. The Warrens' union seems to have been a tempestuous one. In 1772, after eight years of marriage, they jointly applied to the ecclesiastical court for a divorce, making "complaints against each other, for incompatability of temper, and personal habits, mutually repulsive. These mutual objections, were strongly stated in court, and seemed to indicate unappeasable antipathy". She also brought a complaint of cruelty and demanded separate maintenance. After a protracted court hearing during which both made a "public exposition of their grievances, resentments, and aversions," the separation was granted though the complaint of cruelty was dismissed.

   Then the couple returned home to Poynton-Hall and lived together again until Sir George's death in 1801, presumably because without an award of separate maintenance, Frances could not afford to set up home anywhere else. She outlived him, and died in 1804. Sir George had certainly been cruel to himself, if not to the wife whose proximity he evidently found so irksome. The case deserves to find a place in any book about the Great Divorce Disasters of the Georgian Age. 

   When he died in 1801, his funeral procession at Poynton was said to have been one of the grandest seen for many years, apart from those of the royal family. Whether his wife attended, we do not know. [2] Her own death, in 1804, was shocking and tragic. She was staying at Brighton in February that year and was alone in her bedroom when a spark from the hearth set her muslin gown on fire. She attempted to extinguish it by wrapping the bed-curtains around her, but they too caught fire. By the time her servants rescued her she was severely burned. A crowd saw the flames in the house on North Parade and several gentlemen carried her out to that of a neighbour. A few days later she died.[3]

   The signed painting, oil on canvas, 35.43 x 27.56 inches, shows Sir George wearing his full regalia as a Knight of the Bath. It is for sale at auction on November 3rd 2026. [4]

[1] William Betham. The Baronetage of England, Or The History of the English Baronets, and Such Baronets of Scotland, as are of English Families; with Genealogical Tables, and Engravings of Their Coats of Arms. 1801. Volume 1 pp.20, 195.

[2] The Gentleman's Magazine, obituaries Sept 1801, p.861.

[3] The Lady's Magazine, Or, Entertaining Companion for the Fair Sex, Appropriated Solely to Their Use and Amusement. Volume 35. 1804, p.110.

[4] https://www.mutualart.com/