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The Ramsay-Polk Family at Carpenter's Point, Cecil County, Maryland

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Photography by Dwight Primiano
The Ramsay-Polk Family at Carpenter's Point, Cecil County, Maryland
Photography by Dwight Primiano

The Ramsay-Polk Family at Carpenter's Point, Cecil County, Maryland

Artist (1749 - 1831)
Dateca. 1793
MediumOil on canvas
Dimensions49 1/8 × 39 3/8 in. (124.8 × 100 cm)
Framed: 57 1/2 × 48 3/4 × 4 3/4 in.
ClassificationsPainting
Credit LineCrystal Bridges Museum of American Art, Bentonville, Arkansas, 2007.2
Accession number 2007.2
On View
On view
Provenanceby descent to Jane Peale Simes [1785-1834] (Artist's daughter), 1831; to Mary Jane Simes Yeates [1807-1872] (her daughter); to Olivia Yeates (her daughter); to Horace Wells Sellers [1857-1933] (her third cousin and great-grandson of Charles Willson Peale), Ardmore, PA, ca. 1910; to Jessie Sellers Walton [1906-1985] (his daughter), 1928. Lawrence A. Fleischman [1925-1997] and Barbara Fleischman, Detroit, MI, by 1955; to (Kennedy Galleries, New York, NY), until 1962; to Mr. and Mrs. Lammot du Pont Copeland, Jr., Mount Cuba, Greenville, DE, 2006; to (Hirschl & Adler Galleries, New York, NY), 2006; purchased by Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art, Bentonville, AR, 2007


Label TextThis portrait depicts three members of an elite Philadelphia family who fled to an estate in Maryland to escape the 1793 Philadelphia yellow fever epidemic that claimed 5,000 lives in three months’ time. The women shown here were in-law relatives of James Peale’s deceased sister. Through their connections to the prominent Peale family of Philadelphia—many of whom were also respected artists—they were able to sit for this portrait in a time of exile and uncertainty.

Este retrato representa tres miembros de una prominente familia de Filadelfia quienes huyeron a una hacienda en Maryland a causa de la epidemia de fiebre amarilla que se desató en Filadelfia en 1793. Esta epidemia cobró la vida de 5,000 personas en tan sólo tres meses. Las mujeres en este retrato son familiares políticos de la hermana fallecida de James Peale. A través de sus conexiones con la prestigiosa familia Peale, muchos de los cuales también fueron artistas prominentes, pudieron posar para este retrato en un momento de exilio e incertidumbre