A group of ships belonging to the East India Company are shown in fair weather with Table Mountain, Cape Town, in the background on the right. The ship on the right is shown in starboard and stern view with men in the rigging preparing to lower her sails. The one in the centre is in starboard-broadside view. She flies the red ensign from the peak and signal flags and pennants from her three mastheads. She is firing a salute to indicate that the small fleet is preparing to enter Cape Town. The one on the left, painted as a two-decker warship, is shown in starboard-bow view and also flies the red ensign. Another can be seen beyond her. The basis for the identification of the ships derives from the painting's received title and it is currently unclear. The one in the centre is presumed to be the 'Scaleby Castle' and that on the right the 'Charles Grant'. The 'two-decker' may in fact be a Royal Naval vessel, as it appears, with the 'Minerva' beyond.

The first of the named vessels to enter service with the East India Company in 1806 was the 1,242 ton 'Scaleby Castle' which was built in Bombay in 1798. She had 26 guns and sailed on her maiden voyage with some 15 European officers and 115 Indian crew. Constructed of teak, the vessel undertook a record number of 14 voyages before completing its Company service in 1832. In October 1834, it was sold to Henry Templer for £6,900 and repaired, provisioned and made ready for sea, before being sold to James Walkinshaw for £13,500. The 1,246 ton 'Charles Grant' was also built of teak in Bombay and entered service with the Company in 1810. The vessel undertook 11 voyages to the East before completing its service in 1831. In 1834, it was sold for £8,500 to Messrs Hyde and Lennox.

The 'Minerva', 976 tons, was built in Bombay in 1813 and undertook ten voyages for the Company between 1814 and 1831. In August of that year, the vessel was purchased by Henry Templer who paid £9,400 for the ship and £2,400 for the captain's stores at sea. The three vessels did not sail together before 1829. In 1820, the date of the painting, the vessels may have been together at sea but were more likely to have passed in the Bay of Biscay during May rather than off the Cape, since the 'Scaleby Castle' was actually outward bound for China, while the other two were on the return leg of a voyage that had commenced in early 1819. It is also unlikely that the artist ever visited Cape Town. The scene is therefore almost certainly fictional and the painting was probably commissioned in England to demonstrate three of the Company's most successful vessels at the height of their activities, possibly by someone with a commercial interest or otherwise connected with them.

Whitcombe exhibited several paintings with Cape Town as the background between 1789 and 1818. He was born in London in about 1752 and painted ship portraits, battle scenes, harbour views and ships in storms. Although his output was vast, little is known about him. He produced a large number of subjects from the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars, 1793-1815, and exhibited at the Royal Academy between 1783 and 1824. His depiction of ships implies specific knowledge of life at sea, although he probably spent most of his career in London. Many of his works were engraved and they included 50 plates to James Jenkins's account of 'The Naval Achievements of Great Britain', published in 1817. This painting is signed and dated 'Th. Whitcombe 1820'. The National Maritime Museum also holds a full-hull ship model of the 'Charles Grant'.