Evelyn's Diary. 18 Aug 1688. The house, or rather palace, at Althorpe [Map], is a noble uniform pile in form of a half H, built of brick and freestone, balustered and à la moderne; the hall is well, the staircase excellent; the rooms of state, galleries, offices and furniture, such as may become a great prince. It is situated in the midst of a garden, exquisitely planted and kept, and all this in a park walled in with hewn stone, planted with rows and walks of trees, canals and fish ponds, and stored with game. And, what is above all this, governed by a [his mother] lady (age 42), who without any show of solicitude, keeps everything in such admirable order, both within and without, from the garret to the cellar, that I do not believe there is any in this nation, or in any other, that exceeds her in such exact order, without ostentation, but substantially great and noble. The meanest servant is lodged so neat and cleanly; the service at the several tables, the good order and decency-in a word, the entire economy is perfectly becoming a wise and noble person. She is one who for her distinguished esteem of me from a long and worthy friendship, I must ever honor and celebrate. I wish from my soul the [his father] Lord (age 46), her husband (whose parts and abilities are otherwise conspicuous), was as worthy of her, as by a fatal apostasy and court-ambition he has made himself unworthy! This is what she deplores, and it renders her as much affliction as a lady of great soul and much prudence is capable of. The [his grandmother] Countess of Bristol (age 68), her mother, a grave and honorable lady, has the comfort of seeing her daughter and grandchildren under the same economy, especially Mr. Charles Spencer (age 13), a youth of extraordinary hopes, very learned for his age, and ingenious, and under a Governor of great worth. Happy were it, could as much be said of the elder brother, the [his brother] Lord Spencer, who, rambling about the world, dishonors both his name and his family, adding sorrow to sorrow to a mother, who has taken all imaginable care of his education. There is a [his sister] daughter (age 17) very young married to the Earl of Clancarty (age 20), who has a great and fair estate in Ireland, but who yet gives no great presage of worth,-so universally contaminated is the youth of this corrupt and abandoned age! But this is again recompensed by my Lord Arran (age 30), a sober and worthy gentleman, who has espoused the [his sister] Lady Ann Spencer (age 21), a young lady of admirable accomplishments and virtue.

In 1710. John James Baker. Known as "Whig Junto". From www.tate.org ... This is a portrait of a political group named the Whig Junto and a Black servant, whose identity is unknown. It is the only known portrait of the Junto, which was an ideologically close-knit group of political peers who formed the leadership of the Whig party in the late seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries. The members of the group are shown gathered together on a grand terrace, while a vista onto a garden is revealed by the Black servant, who holds back a heavy velvet curtain. The grand architectural setting is imagined, and is deliberately evocative of power and status. The picture was commissioned by Edward Russell, 1st Earl of Orford (age 57), who stands on the right, as if welcoming the company. It is not known if Orford (age 57) had a Black servant in his household or whether the individual was included to emphasise Orford's (age 57) wealth and social standing. At the time, Britain was profiting heavily from the trade of enslaved people from West Africa. The presence of Black servants, many of whom were enslaved, in both aristocratic and merchant households had come to symbolise property and wealth. This reflected the dehumanising view of enslaved Black people held by the British elite.

The scene conjures one of the Junto's country house meetings where, in between parliamentary sessions, policy and party strategy were formulated. From left to right the sitters round the table can be identified as Charles Spencer, 3rd Earl of Sunderland (age 34); Thomas Wharton, 1st Marquess of Wharton (age 61); John Somers, 1st Baron Somers (1C 1697) (age 58); Charles Montagu, 1st Earl of Halifax (age 48); and William Cavendish, 2nd Duke of Devonshire (age 38). The lavish surroundings probably represent Orford's (age 57) house, Chippenham, where Junto meetings sometimes took place. It was also ideally located for the nearby Newmarket horse races, which the members of the Junto frequently attended when parliament was not sitting.

The portrait is dated 1710, before the crushing electoral defeat of the Whigs in October of that year. It shows the political allies while in power, when Sunderland (age 34) was Secretary of State, Wharton (age 61) Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, Somers Lord President of the Privy Council, Devonshire (age 38) Lord Steward and a member of the Privy Council, and Orford (age 57) First Lord of the Admiralty. On the surface the portrait shows a relaxed gathering of fellow connoisseurs, seated round a table consulting antique medals and books of prints. Fittingly, Somers and Halifax (age 48) sit at the centre of the company, holding a book and handling a medal respectively. Both were known collectors and antiquarians - Somers was one of the founders of the Whig Kit-Cat Club, a convivial drinking and dining club, but which also had a political propagandist agenda; he had also purchased the Resta collection of drawings from Italy in 1709. Halifax (age 48) had a celebrated library and a collection of antique medals (sold in 1740), to which those being consulted presumably allude. Behind this exterior of cultural appreciation, however, the portrait advertises Whig policy in 1709-10, which supported the continuation of war against France in opposition to Tory calls for peace. The two visible prints are friezes from Trajan's column showing episodes from the Dacian wars, with the Roman army crossing the Danube. The viewer is invited to make parallels between the valour and victories of the Roman emperors and the current military greatness achieved for Britain by the Duke of Marlborough's campaigns. The globe, showing the Pacific, presumably alludes to Whig foreign policy ambitions beyond Europe. By defeating France in Europe, they aimed to gain commercial access to Spanish American trade routes. It reflects the competitive European colonial pursuit of new markets, including the selling of enslaved West African people to Spanish territories overseas.

John James Baker (or Backer, or Bakker) is thought to have been Flemish, from Antwerp. He was Godfrey Kneller's (age 63) (1646-1723) long-time studio assistant and drapery painter, and this is his largest, most ambitious and complex work. The symbolic programme was presumably devised by Orford in discussion with Baker. The Duke of Devonshire was not a regular member of the Junto, although an increasingly important Whig peer, but his inclusion here is presumably because of his kinship relationship with Orford. The picture is thus a demonstration of Orford's private as well as professional networks, and also his pride and ambition. It would have been displayed at Chippenham in the newly appointed, fashionable interiors, alongside other works that Orford commissioned to advertise his public achievement and the private and professional networks that sustained his power and influence.