This print is the fold-out frontispiece inserted in the 1789 second edition of the Revd John Cooke and John Maule's substantial 'An Historical Account of the Royal Hospital for Seamen' originally published in 1784. Cooke was the Hospital's senior chaplain and one of its Directors and it was an official publication for the Hospital. The smaller and succeeding visitor-guidebook 'Description' of the Hospital 'by its chaplains', first published in 1801, was essentially relevant text extracted from it and only acquired a similar single page frontispiece in 1834.

Lancey, who drew and lettered the 1789 image was a Greenwich artist, according to the plate inscription. The other three plates in the edition show the east front of the Infirmary and the Hospital School (see PAD2188 and PAD2189) and ' A View of the Ancient Palace called Placentia in East Greenwich' copied by Newton from Basire's of the 1760s issued by (and acknowledged to) the Society of Antiquaries of London. All also bear the official registration date of 22 September 1789.