Oil on canvas; Height: 28 ½” (72.3 cm); Width: 36 ¼” (92.7 cm). Winterthur Museum, Garden and Library; Winterthur, DE.
Left to right: John Jay, John Adams, Benjamin Franklin, Henry Laurens, William Temple Franklin (secretary and grandson to Franklin). The American peace commissioners posed for this painting, but when their British counterparts refused to pose, West abandoned the painting.
[Lord Frederick] North defended his role in the war for America to his death. He insisted that it did not originate in a despotic wish to tyrannise America, but from the desire of maintaining constitutional authority of Parliament over the colonies.
He admitted that the war with American had been unfortunate but not unjust,
adding that if he had been forced to mount the scaffold in consequence of the part that I have performed in its prosecution, I shall continue to maintain that it was founded in right and dictated by necessity.