Winterhalter was born in the Black Forest where he was encouraged to draw at school. In 1818 he went to Freiburg to study under Karl Ludwig Schüler and then moved to Munich in 1823, where he attended the Academy and studied under Josef Stieler, a fashionable portrait painter. Winterhalter was first brought to the attention of Queen Victoria by the Queen of the Belgians and subsequently painted numerous portraits at the English court from 1842 till his death.

Prince Louis wears the uniform of an officer in the Hessian cavalry regiment with the star of the Order of Louis of Hesse and the badge of Philip of Hesse. In 1862, just over 12 months after this portrait was painted, he married Queen Victoria's third child, Princess Alice, at Osborne House on the Isle of Wight.

Inscribed on the back with the names of the artist and sitter and the date, June 1861.