George Washington, Esqr.

George Washington, dressed in a British military uniform, sits astride a brown horse and carries a sword in this 1775 print produced by the London publishing firm Sayer & Bennett. Sayer & Bennet published the print under a pseudonym because it was not based on any actual portrait of Washington; they invented it to sell to a curious public who wanted to know what the American general looked like. The text on the print states that it was “done from an Original, Drawn from the Life by Alexander Campbell, of Williamsburgh in Virginia” but this was a fiction invented to give the likeness more credibility. The engraver copied uniforms from gallery artwork of the Seven Years' War and invented Washington’s face. When Washington first saw the print in early 1776, he wrote to his friend Joseph Reed: “Mr Campbell whom I never saw (to my knowledge) has made a very formidable figure of the Commander in Chief giving him a sufficient portion of Terror in his Countenance.” Despite its inaccuracy, many people purchased the print and other publishers copied it.