Abigail Chesebrough (Mrs. Alexander Grant)

1754

Joseph Blackburn (English, active in British colonies in North America and Bermuda, 1752–64)

Dressed in imported luxurious fabrics and accessories, 20-year-old Abigail Chesebrough displays the material wealth of her family in Newport, Rhode Island, in this portrait by Joseph Blackburn. Her father, David Chesebrough, was a merchant and an enslaver, amassing his fortune through the triangular trade of people of color, molasses, and rum between Western Africa, the Caribbean, and New England.

Blackburn shaped his career around the Atlantic trade networks developed in the 18th century. Probably trained in London, he traveled to Bermuda in 1752, securing commissions there. Two years later he was in Newport, where he painted Abigail as well as her stepmother. Blackburn moved on to paint portraits in Boston and Portsmouth before returning to England in 1764.

Status: On View, Gallery 166
Department: Arts of the Americas

Artist: Joseph Blackburn
Title: Abigail Chesebrough (Mrs. Alexander Grant)
Place: Newport (Object made in:)
Date Dates are not always precisely known, but the Art Institute strives to present this information as consistently and legibly as possible. Dates may be represented as a range that spans decades, centuries, dynasties, or periods and may include qualifiers such as c. (circa) or BCE.: 1754
Medium: Oil on canvas
Inscriptions: Signed on bottom of window at right: "I Blackburn Pinxt 1754"
Dimensions: 127.6 × 101.5 cm (50 × 40 in.)
Credit Line: Bequest of Miss Amelia Peabody
Reference Number: 1984.725
IIIF Manifest The International Image Interoperability Framework (IIIF) represents a set of open standards that enables rich access to digital media from libraries, archives, museums, and other cultural institutions around the world. Learn more.: https://api.artic.edu/api/v1/artworks/102777/manifest.json

Bolton and Binsse, Antiquarian (Nov., 1930), 50, ff.
Morgan and Foote, “Descriptive List of the Work of Joseph Blackburn,” American Antiquarian Society 110 (1937), 30–31.
Judith A. Barter, et al., American Arts at The Art Institute of Chicago: From Colonial Times to World War I (Art Institute of Chicago, 1998), 71–75, cat. 17 (ill.).
Michael J. Boonstra, “Descendants of ‘King’ David Chesebrough of Newport, Rhode Island, With Clues to the Identity of His Son-In-Law, Hon. Alexander Grant, Esq., of Scotland, Newport, Nova Scotia, Jamaica, and London,” The New England Historical and Genealogical Register 156, no. 624 (Oct., 2002), 372–88 (ill.).

David Chesebrough (1702/3–1782), Newport, RI, and Stonington, CT, 1754 [father of the sitter; this and the following according to letter from Dr. Charles M. Williams to Robert C. Vose, Jr., c. 1970; copy in curatorial object file]; by descent to his daughter, Abigail Grant (1734–by Dec. 1, 1807; born Abigail Chesebrough, also Mrs. Alexander Grant), Newport, RI, and London, 1782 [the sitter]; by descent to her grandson, Deacon David Chesebrough Smith (1782–1833), Stonington, CT, 1808; by descent to his daughter, Betsey Chesebrough Williams (1806–1860; born Betsey Chesebrough Smith, also Mrs. Charles Phelps Williams, Sr.), Stonington, CT, 1833; by descent to her daughter, Bessie S. Sherman (1832–1915; born Bessie S. Williams; also Mrs. Ezra Lewis Sherman), Chicago, 1860; given to the Stonington Historical Society, Stonington, CT, 1916 [letter from Dr. J. H. Weeks to Dr. C. Williams, Dec. 23, 1916; copy in curatorial object file]; consigned to Vose Galleries, Boston, by Oct., 1970 [Antiques Oct., 1970, 561]; Amelia Peabody (1890–1984), Boston, 1977; bequeathed to the Art Institute of Chicago, 1984.

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Date Dates are not always precisely known, but the Art Institute strives to present this information as consistently and legibly as possible. Dates may be represented as a range that spans decades, centuries, dynasties, or periods and may include qualifiers such as c. (circa) or BCE.

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IIIF Manifest The International Image Interoperability Framework (IIIF) represents a set of open standards that enables rich access to digital media from libraries, archives, museums, and other cultural institutions around the world.

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