Inscribed, centre bottom, 'Victory', but not in the artist's hand.This watercolour appears to show 'Victory' either towards the completion of her restoration or, from the crowd going round her stern to entry via the gangway on the port (here right) side, when she was first opened to the public. According to the artist's wife, Marion, in her memoir of him (M.A. Wyllie, 'We Were One' [London,1935]):

'The spring of 1924 saw Bill at work on a large canvas of his beloved “Victory”, which had now got as far as a coat of pale pink. The Admiral Superintendent allowed him the use of one of the offices with a window facing '”Victory's” bow, from which he was able to paint in peace and depict with loving care every detail of the fine old ship.'

The picture in question was 'The Nelson Touch' exhibited at the Royal Academy in the spring of 1925, now in the collection of the NMM (BHC3701), and on loan to the Royal Naval Museum in Portsmouth. That, however, showed work still in progress while present drawing, is a later study since -apart from the crowd attending - it shows the ship at her final position in the No 2 dry-dock at Portsmouth, not as in the oil painting. In March-April 1925,after that was complete, she was refloated in the dock, in which she originally sat at a lower level, to bring her waterline up to the level of the dock edge. She was then resupported in that position as she remains today.