Richard Parker who was executed on board the Sandwich off Sheerness on Friday June 30th 1797, pursuant to the sentence of a Court Martiall, for having been the Principal in a most daring Mutiny on board several of his RMG PU3034

Richard Parker who was executed on board the Sandwich off Sheerness on Friday June 30th 1797, pursuant to the sentence of a Court Martiall, for having been the Principal in a most daring Mutiny on board several of his Majesty's Ships at the Nore, & which created a dreadful alarm through the whole Nation
A half-length portrait print, in conventional oval format, of Richard Parker, who, as the caption states, was the leader of the naval mutiny at the Nore in May and June 1797. Following swiftly on from the mutiny of the fleet at Spithead – which was quickly recognized as a seaman’s strike with justifications that were eventually resolved – that at the Nore was seen as a greater crisis at a difficult time in the war against France, from the widespread belief that radical democratic and republican elements had fomented it. However, it is unclear to what extent such political sympathies extended through the lower-deck population: the grievances of the majority were directed, as at Spithead, principally against poor pay and conditions. The crisis was averted when, after lengthy negotiations, the first ships broke away from the mutiny on 9 June, after which its leaders rapidly capitulated. Parker was court-martialled and hanged on his ship, the ‘Sandwich’, on 30 June, as the caption states, ‘for having been the Principal in a most daring Mutiny on board several of his Majesty’s Ships at the Nore, & which created a dreadful alarm through the whole Nation’. The makers of this print can reasonably be identified as the printmaker, painter and draughtsman John Bailey (1750-1819) and F. Sansom, an engraver operating at th end of the 18th century.

Richard Parker who was executed on board the Sandwich off Sheerness on Friday June 30th 1797, pursuant to the sentence of a Court Martiall, for having been the Principal in a most daring Mutiny on board several of his Majesty's Ships at the Nore, & which created a dreadful alarm through the whole Nation