Franz Goedecker

With other Germans living in England, including the painter Richard Huttula, Carl Haag, Wilhelm Kumpel, and Joseph Wolf, an animal-painter, Goedecker joined the London-based Verein für Kunst und Wissenschaft (Society for Art and Science).

[8] In 1883, The Theatre described Goedecker as "The leading spirit of the parody, and one of the most popular members of the club... one of the very ablest of living caricaturists..." and noted that on a recent occasion he had modelled a head of Bismarck and another of Sir Julius Benedict in only five minutes.

[18] Roy T. Matthews calls it "one of the notable examples of the consistency of Vanity Fair's style of caricature" and says of it "The aging general’s features and figure are sharply exaggerated, so that in a glance the viewer can comprehend the essence of the individual, yet recognize the man.

"[18] In March 1883, Goedecker sent John Ruskin photographs of some of his work, and received a reply:[19] I see no matter of merriment either in the weakness of age or the abortions of vulgar form; and I sincerely hope that you will not waste your real powers in pandering to the malice or the stupidity of those people who do.

If you add to your present gift of seizing grotesque or abnormal character the skill proper to a painter, you might take a position of most useful influence in representing the evils and dangers of our great cities and manufactories: and you might win for yourself such an honourable fame as that of Hogarth, instead of the momentary praise of amusing the idleness of evening parties.A later writer commented on this that Ruskin had himself been caricatured in Vanity Fair more than once.