The Five of Hearts

This anonymous satirical etching of c.1756, titled Byng's turn to Ride and preserved in the British Museum, sits within an 18th-century English print tradition in which playing cards function as visual shorthand for politics, a game of chance where risks are taken and outcomes hinge on luck as much as judgement.

Above: Byng's turn to Ride, an anonymous satirical print, c.1756, representing Admiral John Byng. © The Trustees of the British Museum, museum number 1868,0808.13217 ►

Byng failed to relieve a besieged British garrison during the Battle of Minorca at the beginning of the Seven Years' War. The print recasts the failed expedition as a misplayed hand. Admiral John Byng (1704-1757) is shown mounted on a sea-lion - an allusion to Lord Anson - complaining, “I’ll flog ye Lyon for Contracting my Letter” while holding a paper marked “My Secretary”. The scene refers to Byng’s dispatch of 4 May 1756, in which he reported insufficient force to engage the French navy; a message received in London without sympathy and later used against him.

The inclusion of the five of hearts as an index in the upper left-hand corner transforms the print into a visual analogue of a playing card, signalling statecraft and war as a game of chance and risk - just as it is today as in “having all the cards”. In this context, the modest value of five is neither strong nor decisive, suggesting either Byng’s perceived lack of resolve or the government’s failure to furnish him with the means to succeed. The image encapsulates the episode as a fatal misdeal in which responsibility is shuffled and Byng becomes an expendable card.

Reference

Wikipedia : John Byng ►