Peter Humfrey’s in-depth analysis of the Stafford Gallery, based on original research, shows how it represented the greatest art collection in Regency London during the quarter century of its existence, from 1806 to 1830. This book also provides the first detailed history of the Bridgewater collection, tracing the story from the Third Duke of Bridgewater’s purchases in Rome in the 1750s, to the major acquisitions of the 1790s, through the incorporation of the collection into the Stafford Gallery by the Second Marquess of Stafford, and finally to its reinstallation by Lord Francis Egerton in the new Bridgewater House in 1851.
 
As well as providing a detailed account of the personalities and differing motives of three generations of collectors and owners, The Stafford Gallery examines the ways in which the collection was arranged and displayed. Humfrey also explores the reactions to it by contemporaries—from sophisticated critics such as William Hazlitt to the general public—and analyzes major publications on it, including the four-volume 1818 illustrated catalogue by William Young Ottley. The thorough exploration of the famous collection is accompanied by 150 color illustrations, including many works that sold from the collection after 1946 and are now widely dispersed.