Lot 188: RAPHAELLE PEALE 1774-1825

PAIR OF MINIATURE PORTRAITS ON IVORY: LYMAN SPALDING, MD AND MRS. ELIZABETH SPALDING

PAIR OF MINIATURE PORTRAITS ON IVORY: LYMAN SPALDING, MD AND MRS. ELIZABETH SPALDING

2 1/2 by 2 in. (6.4 by 5.1cm)

watercolor on ivory

NOTE

Each mounted in rolled gold frames (gold over copper) with plain bezel locket frames. The portrait of Dr. Spalding enclosing a plait of light brown hair engraved, Lyman Spalding M.D. of Portsmouth, N.H. and New York City. Born 5th June 1775/Died 30th October 1821. Painted by Rembrandt Peale.
The portrait of Mrs. Spalding engraved, Mrs. Elizabeth Spalding, Daughter of Peter Coues of Portsmouth, N.H. and wife of Lyman Spalding, M.D. Born 16th December 1779. Died June 2nd 1838. Painted by Rembrandt Peale Philadelphia February 1810.

Raphaelle Peale was the eldest son of Charles Willson Peale. Raphaelle apprenticed in his father's studio learning miniature painting under the instruction of James Peale, his uncle. After taking over his father's portrait studio with his brother Rembrandt, Raphaelle painted miniatures and Rembrandt the full-size works. There are no recorded miniatures by Rembrandt, suggesting that the engraving on the casings identifying Rembrandt as the painter of these two miniatures of the Lyman Spaldings, done after the actual creation of the paintings, is erroneous.

Lyman Spalding was born in Cornish, New Hampshire, 5 June 1775; died in Portsmouth, New Hampshire, 30 October 1821. He was graduated at Harvard Medical School, with the degree of M.D., in 1797. In 1798, while still a student, he assisted Professor Nathan Smith in establishing the medical school at Dartmouth. He was given the degree of M.D. by Dartmouth in 1804 and Harvard in 1811. On October 9, 1802, Dr. Spalding married Elizabeth Coues (1779-1838), daughter of Peter and Elizabeth (Jackson) Coues of Portsmouth. In 1813, he moved to New York City. Dr. Spalding was active in introducing into the United States the practice of vaccination as a preventive of the small-pox. He was a trustee of the only free schools that New York then possessed and aided in the establishment of the first Sunday-schools in New York. (Excerpted from Appletons Encyclopedia, 2001)