John Jackson was a portrait painter and copyist who exhibited at the Royal Academy from 1804 until his death; he was a friend of David Wilkie (1786-1841) and Benjamin Robert Haydon (1786-1846).

Jackson exhibited a portrait of the Duke of York at the Royal Academy in 1822, which seems to have been either this painting or a version of it, for Samuel Reynolds (1773-1835) published a mezzotint of this design in the same year (NPG D8026).

The Duke is shown wearing the star of the Garter, with the ribbon of the Bath appearing under his coat; he sports the then fashionable high white collar and black neck cravat.