In the wake of Etty's elevation to Academician, he exhibited two paintings at the Summer Exhibition in 1829, Benaiah, David's Chief Captain and Hero, Having Thrown Herself from the Tower at the Sight of Leander Drowned, Dies on his Body.
Benaiah is on the same large scale as The Combat at 398 cm (13 ft 1 in) wide, and is a very similar composition, although in place of the woman begging for mercy is the body of a dead soldier.
Hero recycles the pose of the dead soldier from Benaiah as the dying Hero as she lies on the body of her dead lover.
Unusually for Etty, Hero is painted in intentionally neutral tones rather than his usual Venetian colours, and the composition uses foreshortening of the bodies to create a single diagonal across the canvas.
For the rest of his life, Etty considered Hero to be "the finest of my fine pictures".

On 7 January 1830 Etty's mentor Thomas Lawrence died, followed on 30 July by Etty's mother.
Etty was devastated by the loss, and was one of those considered to replace Lawrence as President of the Royal Academy, although in the event he did not stand for election.
Possibly distracted by the death of Lawrence, Etty submitted only three paintings to the Summer Exhibition that year.
One of these, Judith Going Forth, was an addition to Judith, which had been commissioned the previous year by that painting's new owners, the Royal Scottish Academy.
In the wake of Etty's elevation to Academician, he exhibited two paintings at the Summer Exhibition in 1829, Benaiah, David's Chief Captain and Hero, Having Thrown Herself from the Tower at the Sight of Leander Drowned, Dies on his Body. Benaiah is on the same large scale as The Combat at 398 cm (13 ft 1 in) wide, and is a very similar composition, although in place of the woman begging for mercy is the body of a dead soldier. Hero recycles the pose of the dead soldier from Benaiah as the dying Hero as she lies on the body of her dead lover. Unusually for Etty, Hero is painted in intentionally neutral tones rather than his usual Venetian colours, and the composition uses foreshortening of the bodies to create a single diagonal across the canvas. For the rest of his life, Etty considered Hero to be "the finest of my fine pictures".
On 7 January 1830 Etty's mentor Thomas Lawrence died, followed on 30 July by Etty's mother. Etty was devastated by the loss, and was one of those considered to replace Lawrence as President of the Royal Academy, although in the event he did not stand for election. Possibly distracted by the death of Lawrence, Etty submitted only three paintings to the Summer Exhibition that year. One of these, Judith Going Forth, was an addition to Judith, which had been commissioned the previous year by that painting's new owners, the Royal Scottish Academy.
William Etty