June 1914 saw the Salvation Army World Congress in London, to which the delegates included a party of Zulus. Various groups, including the Zulus, toured the country and put on displays, e.g. in Sheffield and Dundee. It seems likely that Somerville had opportunity to paint one or more of the Zulu party since there are three such portraits by him on Art UK. The present one was exhibited in May 1915 at the 18th London exhibition of the International Society of Sculptors, Painters & Gravers, held at the Grosvenor Gallery. The sitter may be the same man shown in Zulu dress as ‘Nigel, a Zulu’ in a three-quarter-length portrait now in the Grundy Art Gallery, Blackpool, and which Somerville perhaps retained until at least 1939 when he entered it (or another with that title) in an exhibition at Worthing.