A half-length oval portrait, showing the sitter turned to viewer's right, in armour and wearing a brown full-bottomed wig. Allin came from Lowestoft and served with Prince Rupert in the exiled Royalist squadron after the execution of Charles I ended the Civil War. In the Second Dutch War, 1665–67, he fought at the Battle of Lowestoft, 1665, (for his portrait by Lely as one of the 'flagmen' there, see BHC2512) and commanded the van at the St James's Day Fight, 1666. He was twice commander-in-chief in the Mediterranean and later Comptroller of the Navy. Allin probably commissioned Willem van de Velde the Younger's famous painting now called '"Resolution" in a gale' (BHC5382), which appears to represent her as his flagship in a storm in the Mediterranean in 1669.

This portrait is inscribed, lower right, 'Admiral Sir Thomas Allin of Someley Hall Natt.[natavit] 1613 Ob[iit].1685'. This refers to Somerleyton Hall, near Lowestoft, Suffolk, where he died in retirement. This portrait, or a version of it, was engraved by Pieter Vanderbank in 1685 (PAH5382): there is also an 1819 re-engraving after Vanderbank (PAD4664, PAD2629). It relates to a full-length version at Somerleyton, though the present Hall is a Victorian remodelling of the house (1844). Inscription '1905' on stretcher.