The naval officer and politician Sir Charles Napier (1786-1860) is one of the remarkable figures of the late Georgian and early Victorian Navy, with qualities of energy and initiative that put him in the same bracket as Nelson and Sidney Smith both for risk-taking and effectiveness, the regard in which he was held by men serving under him and the eccentricities that alienated more conventional minds. He was a supporter of technical innovation (notably steam powered naval vessels) and is regarded as a hero in Portugal for service in their navy in the early 1830s that restored the sovereignty of Queen Maria II against the Miguelite regime. The bust was cast in 1854, at the beginning of the Crimean war, and a significant moment in Napier’s career. Though an effective commander in the early Baltic theatre of the Crimean War, in 1854, this was his last command after he was made a political scapegoat for government failings in the Crimean context. In 1855 Napier was elected Member of Parliament, and he took his dispute with the Admiralty on to the floor of the House of Commons, where he continued a lifelong campaign to improve the lot of the common seaman. He died in 1860, a few months after having been made a full admiral.
Thomas Thornycroft (1815-85) was a British sculptor and engineer, who enjoyed royal patronage, notably for the Great Exhibition of 1851, and the Albert memorial in 1867. In later life Thornycroft worked with his elder son John Isaac Thornycroft (1843-1928, founder of Thornycroft shipbuilders) on designs for steam launches, a subject of interest to Napier.