Colonel Charles Rooke, Windsor Foresters (Volunteer Fencible Cavalry), 1794 (c)

Miniature portrait in watercolour on ivory, artist unknown, 1794 (c).

The miniature is set in a glazed, gold frame. On the reverse are four plaits of hair surrounding an oval piece of blue glass. Alongside each of the plaits is a name inscribed into the frame, 'Jane', 'Willoughby', 'Mary' and 'John Charles'. A fifth lock of hair is curled in the centre on top of the blue glass. It is unidentified but presumably that of the sitter.

Charles Rooke (1746-1827) was the first Colonel of the Windsor Foresters, a regiment of Berkshire Fencible Cavalry, raised on 1 May 1794. The regiment used a forester's horn as its badge, thereby anticipating the Light Infantry by some years. The regiment served in Lincolnshire and Scotland on coastal defence and anti-smuggling duties and was disbanded in early 1800. Rooke died at Windsor Castle in 1827.