A half-length portrait, very slightly to the right, showing Cornford in a grey suit and waistcoat with a white shirt and dark tie; he wears steel-rimmed spectacles. The background is formed of foliage with a view of the sea to the bottom right. Inscribed: ‘This very inadequate recollection was painted in affectionate memory of “One of the Best”’.
Leslie Cope Cornford was the naval correspondent of the ‘Morning Post’ during the First World War and a prolific writer of books on naval affairs. He edited the memoirs of Lord Charles Beresford.