The artist modified the panel in 1814 to show him in full dress uniform with black gold–braided lapels and added the Order of the Golden Fleece and Military Gold Cross with three clasps—both of which Wellington had been awarded in the interim.

Although a successful general, the Wellington depicted by Goya is tired from the long campaigning, having won a victory at the Battle of Salamanca on 22 July 1812 before triumphantly entering Madrid on 12 August 1812.

The half-length portrait shows the subject in a three-quarter profile, facing to his right, with the head turned slightly to the left, towards the viewer.

On 21 August 1961, nineteen days after it was put on display at the National Gallery, the portrait was stolen by a bus driver called Kempton Bunton.

[3] Four years after the theft, Bunton contacted a newspaper, and through a left-luggage office at Birmingham New Street railway station returned the painting voluntarily.

[8] The story of the theft and the following trial of Bunton was dramatised in the film The Duke, directed by Roger Michell and starring Jim Broadbent and Helen Mirren, which was released in cinemas in the UK on 25 February 2022.