Portrait #1657

Additional Details

  • Subject/Title:Murfree, Mary Roberts
  • Artist:Unknown
  • Date Created:early 1800s
  • Owner/Location:Private Collection
  • Frame Dimensions:41 x 34 1/2
  • Image Dimensions:33 x 27
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  • Materials/Media:Oil on canvas
  • Date Documented:2008
  • Condition:Excellent
  • Description:Older woman seated in red chair facing three-quarter right with her hands folded gently in her lap. She is wearing a dark long-sleeved dress with a white lace collar fastened at the neck with an oval brooch. Her white ruffled bonnet is tied on the left of her chin in a large bow with the ends streaming down in front of her left shoulder. The bonnet is back far enough to reveal dark hair, parted in the middle and swooping back over her ears. She is smiling.
  • History:Portrait has passed down through the Murfree family.
  • Notes:Subject born in the Roberts' home, Murfreesboro, North Carolina, in 1797. Her family home was built in 1790 and has been restored as the public library. Subject married her husband, Matthias Brickell Murfree I, in the early 1800s and migrated to Tennessee. She died in Murfreesboro, Tennessee in 1857.