In Search of Answers: A New York Survey

Sampler, 1845 / Catharine Charlotte Wardell / New York City / Silk and wool on silk. Catharine Charlotte Wardell may be the daughter of Henry Wardell and Charlotte Sophia Dodge, although there is a discrepancy in recorded middle names. Catharine Wardell married a William Titsworth. The mother of the donors was also a Titsworth; but the relationship is unclear at this time. The sampler’s date is 1845, a year when New York City’s population was about 400,000. The city was fast becoming a national and international center of trade and commerce and a shopping mecca. (Gift of Misses Anna and Althea Coons)

Sampler, 1833 / Ann Maria Loder / Probably New York City / Silk on linen. Eight-year-old Ann Maria Loder’s sampler is a legacy of beautiful flowers whose blossoms compete with the charming sentiment of her verse. The flowers surrounding the verse are clearly Quaker inspired. The horizontal bands of strawberries encompassing her name are found on New York City Female Association School samplers. Ann Maria married John F. Holmes in 1847 and died in 1903. (Bequest of Ruth Loder Holmes, granddaughter of Ann Maria Loder)

Sampler, about 1836-1837 / Sally Ann Lawrence / Putnam County, New York / Silk and cotton on linen. Sally Ann Lawrence was the daughter of Lany David and Laura Burnam Lawrence of Putnam County in the lower Hudson Valley of New York. She married Henry Crosby, a hotel keeper in the county, and was the mother of two sons. Thematically, she stitched a verse sampler but enlivened her ground with the honeysuckle vine and scarlet flowers. (Gift of Nancy L. Diver, great-great niece of Sally Ann Lawrence)

Sampler, about 1829 / Sarah Ann Underhill / New Rochelle, New York / Silk on linen. The Underhill family Bible reveals that Sarah Ann Underhill, daughter of John B. and Alchia Underhill, was born on February 26, 1820 in New Rochelle, New York. Her father owned a hotel in Mamaroneck. Sarah Ann never married and died in 1877. The sampler remained in the family until sold in 1985-86. The rigid geometric border sets off a marking sampler with assorted motifs including the dark menacing birds with averted heads. (Friends of the Museum Purchase)

Sampler, 1826 / Harriet Soper / Female Association School #2 / New York City / Silk on linen. The Female Association School #2 opened in 1812 joining others in New York City operating under the supervision of Quaker women. In 1837 Harriet Soper married Edward Bishop in New York City. He appears as a shoemaker in the New York City census in 1850. By the 1860s and 1870s, however, he had prospered in the real estate business moving his family to Morrisania, Westchester County. (Gift of Mrs. Thomas E. Bachner in honor of Mrs. Billie Joe Lovett)

Portrait, about 1829 / "Sarah Ann Underhill" / Unidentified artist / Oil on canvas. (Friends of the Museum Purchase)

Portrait, about 1829 / "Sarah Ann Underhill" / Unidentified artist / Oil on canvas. (Friends of the Museum Purchase)

Sampler, 1815 / Mary King / Masonville, New York / Silk on linen. Mary King was a virtual unknown until recent research opened up many details about her life including her birth date of 1809. She married Rev. Sumner Mandeville and the 1880 census records them living in Masonville. At this time, Mary’s daughter and granddaughter also lived in the household along with a boarder. Mary was 82 at her death in 1891, and is buried with her husband at Freedom Plains Cemetery in LaGrange, New York. (Gift of Adeline Palmer)

Sampler, 1830 / Lucy A. Lamb / Granville, New York / Silk on linen. Ten-year-old Lucy Lamb’s marking sampler includes an endearing street scene and names "Mary Howk, Instructress." She married Hiram Duel in 1849, and soon thereafter the young couple, with many Duel family relatives and friends, migrated to Wisconsin and settled in Fond du Lac County. (Gift of Gertrude Duel Icks, granddaughter of Lucy A. Lamb)

Sampler, 1832 / Polly Morrill / Huntington, New York / Silk on linen. Polly Morrill never finished her marking sampler but did anchor it with some sprightly little motifs as if her intention was completion. At her death in 1897, the sampler passed to her daughter and ultimately to her granddaughter. Polly became the third wife of Gideon Barber in 1847. Census records reveal they lived in Canton, St. Lawrence County, New York. (Gift of Clara E. Purvee, granddaughter of Polly Morrill)

Sampler, 1824-30 / Sarah Ann Parker / Plattsburgh, New York / Silk on linen. Sarah Ann Parker was born in 1814, the daughter of Joseph and Judith Parker of Plattsburgh, New York. The account of her mother’s death in 1832 is a horrific reminder of 19th century virulent diseases and epidemics. When Sarah Ann was 18, Mrs. Parker died of cholera, and to prevent panic, she was secretly buried at night. Headstones at the family plot in Riverside Cemetery, Plattsburgh indicate Sarah Ann died at the age of 55 on June 23, 1870. (Gift of the New York State Society)

Needlework picture, 1817 / Caroline Litchfield Newcomb / Litchfield Female Academy / Silk and watercolor on silk. This is the museum’s only printwork, an embroidery executed in neutral colors to resemble a print. Silk needlework memorials were often worked at fashionable schools in remembrance of scarcely-known deceased family members. However this example is all too realistic, memorializing Bloom grandparents and six brothers and sisters. Caroline married Filkins Cheeseman in Pleasant Valley, New York in 1822 and was the mother of four sons. She died in Pleasant Valley in 1850. (Gift of Mrs. John H. Bruns in memory of Caroline Newcomb Cheeseman, granddaughter of Caroline L. Newcomb)

Sampler, 1831 / Cordelia Cheeseman / Dutchess County, New York / Silk on linen. The same donor also gave the printwork stitched by Caroline Newcomb who married into the Cheeseman family, but her relationship to Cordelia is yet unknown. Cordelia was the daughter of Joshua and Mehitable Cheeseman, his first wife. Mehitable died in 1826 and Joshua remarried in 1831, the same year Cordelia signed her unfinished sampler. Cordelia died at eighteen and is buried with her mother, a sister, and a brother in the church yard of St. James Episcopal Church near the village of Hyde Park. (Gift of Mrs. John H. Bruns)

Map sampler, September 13, 1805 / Gertrude Husted / Pleasant Valley School / Silk, paint, and ink on silk. This is one of the earliest map samplers worked at the Pleasant Valley School. Gertrude, known by the endearing name "Gitty," was the daughter of Ebenezer Husted and Sarah Germond of Stanford in Dutchess County. She was only nine when she carefully stitched the eastern and western hemispheres at another of the influential schools founded by women members of the Society of Friends. (Private collection)