My Favorite Painting

The Duchess of Devonshire, 1876

Georgiana was often referred to as "the beautiful Duchess of Devonshire" but as multiple sources and her own mother have claimed, she wasn't physically beautiful. Historians base their opinion on her portraits, which just show how biased I am because I see a physically beautiful woman looking back. But the portraits could also be inaccurate because Georgiana was a very difficult person for artists to paint for some reason. Gainsborough was said to have thrown down his paintbrush in frustration because he couldn't properly capture her countenance, and even her son. Hart, would go on to say no painting ever really looked like her. Similarly, when Fanny Burney finally met Georgiana she was surprised how average the looks of "the beautiful duchess" were. But upon further meetings she changed her mind and decided Georgiana was indeed beautiful.
This painting was preserved until this day. But for some time it got stolen.
Adam Worth, a master criminal with a history of robbing banks and forging documents, stole Thomas Gainsborough’s ” Duchess of Devonshire” to get the bail money needed to release his jailed brother. When the brother got out of prison on his own, Worth initially kept the painting, but later sold it for a ransom. He died a year later with little money to speak of. Fun Fact: Worth was the inspiration for Sherlock Holmes’ arch nemesis, Dr. Moriarty, in Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s novels.