This watercolour portrait of Colonel Mathias by H. Carl Schiller was painted in 1855, signed and dated by the artist. 

Schiller taught as Drawing Master at Hull College (established 1836) from 1841 and advertised himself as a Portrait and Miniature Painter, offering private lessons in landscape, figure and perspective drawing as well as painting in oils and watercolours. He had work shown in the V&A and his work is now in their collections. His daughter, Madeline (1843 – 1911) was a well-respected pianist. 

The Mathias family lived in Gloyne, near Narberth. Mathias was a Colonel in the army at the time of the Sepoy Mutiny in 1857. The Sepoy Mutiny was a significant uprising against British rule in India that led to the demise of the British East India Company and to direct control of the sub-continent by the British Government, a period known as the Raj. The historian W. Dalrymple describes the thousands of revenge hangings and murders as "probably the bloodiest episode in the entire history of British colonialism." 

In 1877, Queen Victoria was proclaimed Empress of India, and British rule continued until independence was gained in 1947, a movement that drew much inspiration from the mutiny almost a century before.