The basis for the date 1845 is not clear and the received title said the picture showed troops embarking, when they are clearly coming ashore at Gravesend in small numbers.

The 'Prince of Wales' was one of Green's large 'Blackwall frigate' Indiamen, built by them at Blackwall in 1842, and specially fitted for carrying troops to the East. If the 1845 date is correct it may show the ship on return from her maiden voyage and she certainly flies the post-1843 Green's house flag at the main. She also has a classical female figurehead and the Prince of Wales's feathers on the side of the stem. The Museum also holds an engraving (PAH0575) of the vessel and an associated logbook (WEL/47) by one Frances Barger, dated 1839-56.

Here the ship is shown anchored off Gravesend, drying sails and her bunting (spread around the poop rail), with Tilbury Fort on the north bank of the Thames under her bow. The river vessels in the left foreground include a swim-head, ketch-rigged Thames barge with a load of baled hay and identified by the number '1274' on the port quarter and 'TILBURY/ [GRAVE]SEND on the transom. The buoy to the right also bears part of the word 'GRAVESEND'. A merchantman flying the Blue Peter (P) flag is passing down stream between the 'Prince of Wales' and the fort, and other shipping can be seen further down river on the right. The name of the artist is unrecorded, though there may be traces of a signature in the extreme bottom right corner under the frame edge). The style, however, suggests it may be John Lynn, a London marine painter known to be working in the period 1828-39 but whose overall career is not well documented. This probability is given a little more weight by the fact that Green Collection holds another painting (BHC3686) by him, signed and dated 1839.