Lot 1152: Henry S. Sadd (1811-1893) after Tompkins H. Matteson (1813-1884) Fine American and European Furniture, Silver, Folk and Decorative Arts and Clocks

Two engraved works: One: The First Prayer in Congress, September 1774 in Carpenters Hall, 1848 The second: Washington Delivering his Inaugural Address (n.d.) The first published by William Pate, 58 & 60 Fulton St., New York, the second published by Fishel Adler & Schwartz, 393 Fifth Avenue, New York The First Prayer: 16 5/8 x 22 3/8in (42.2 x 56.8cm); Washington Delivering his Inaugural Address: 18 1/4 x 25 1/4in (46.4 x 64.1cm)

42.2 x 56.8cm

: The First Prayer: Kennedy Galleries, New York

These engravings were widely disseminated during the decade immediately preceding the Civil War. During this period, images of a heroic and statesmanlike George Washington were used by the North to inspire its efforts to save the Union that Washington had sacrificed so much to establish. Tompkins H. Matteson was a prolific New York history painter who began his career as an itinerant silhouette limner and portrait painter. Politically active on both the state and local level, and devoted to a study of America's past, it is not surprising that his paintings often portrayed events in American history as well as the life of George Washington, subject matter much in demand duringthe middle of the nineteenth century. See Mark Thistlewaite, The Image of George Washington: Studies in Mid-Nineteenth Century American History Painting, Ph.D. dissertation, University of Pennsylvania, 1977, p. 299.