The Winterthur Library

The Joseph Downs Collection of Manuscripts and Printed Ephemera

Henry Francis du Pont Winterthur Museum

5105 Kennett Pike, Winterthur, DE 19735

302-888-4600 or 800-448-3883

OVERVIEW OF THE COLLECTION

Creator: Coates family.

Title: Silhouette collection

Dates: [1800?-1825?]

Call No.: Doc. 139

Acc. No.: 90x34

Quantity: 1 vol. + 55 leaves

Location: 31 B 2

BIOGRAPHICAL STATEMENT

The Coates family included early prominent residents of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania: merchants, importers, and doctors.

SCOPE AND CONTENT

Contains 77 negative silhouettes mounted on black backgrounds, all but three of which are identified on a "List of Names" at the beginning of the volume. There are also six leaves of 'Scherenschnitten' pictures; and then eight un-mounted silhouettes (six of which are identified) laid in. [These loose silhouettes are now in separate sleeves.] Many members of the Coates family are pictured, as are members of the Hornor, Morrison, Evans, Redman, Randolph, Pickering, Hopkins, Snowden, and Yarnall families, and others. (Number 37 from the list in the front is a pencil sketch profile; numbers 73 and 74 are missing.)

One scherenschnitten picture depicts a house with fenced garden, a figure on horseback, a girl in a swing, and a woman walking. Pasted above this are two sprigs of flowers. Two other of these pictures depict houses (one quite small), with figures in the yards. A rather elaborate picture shows two houses, each on either side of a stream spanned by a bridge; two men are in a boat on the stream, and a man on horseback approaches the bridge. Also on this page are several vignettes: a wreath, an incomplete wreath, two birds at a bird bath, a squirrel on top of a hutch, and a woman with a bird cage. On the next page are more vignettes: two of men on horseback, one of a man on a horse driving cattle, and the last depicting two squirrels on a branch. The next picture shows a farm scene, with house, a boar, and sheep tended by a shepherd. The last picture shows rural homes, with a shepherd, a man on horseback, and a strolling couple.

The accompanying mounted photographs show 55 of the silhouettes, with pencilled identifications below that correspond to the "List of Names" in the bound volume.

Dealer noted that most of the silhouettes "have embossed emblem of the Peale eagle or 'Museum' identifying the items as coming from the Peale Museum," and that the "collection has been in the Coates family since its creation until 1989."

LANGUAGE OF MATERIALS

The materials are in English, albeit largely pictorial in nature.

RESTRICTIONS ON ACCESS

Collection is open to the public. Copyright restrictions may apply.

PROVENANCE

Purchased from Thomas Cullen, Rockland Bookman.

ACCESS POINTS

Topics:

Peale Museum.

Quakers - Pennsylvania - Philadelphia - Portraits.

Boats and boating - Pictorial works.

Farms - Pictorial works.

Paper art.

Paper work.

Swings.

Philadelphia (Pa.) - Biography - Portraits.

Silhouettes.

Albums.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE COLLECTION

Location: 31 B 2

Alphabetical list of names in the album:

Ail[?], Elizabeth loose silhouette

Ashton, George 50

Ashton, Hetty 49

Clark, Deborah 47

Clement, Beulah loose silhouette

Clement, Zebedee 80

Coates, Alice loose silhouette

Coates, Benjamin H. (Dr.) 28

Coates, Beulah 3

Coates, George M. 41

Coates, Josiah 4

Coates, Josiah L. 19

Coates, Rebecca 42

Coates, Samuel 27

Coates, Sarah 15, 58

Coates, Sidney 14

Dawson, Charles 36

Dawson, Mary 32

De Benneville, Ann 23

Ely, Elias 73 [missing]

English, Jane Fell 53

Evans, Anne N. 24

Evans, John 18

Evans, Rebecca 17

Evans, Sidney 46

Foster, Sarah 31

Gardner, Rachel 55

Hopkins, Ann 43

Hopkins, Beulah 71

Hopkins, James 34

Hopkins, Rebecca 66

Hopkins, Sarah 9

Hornor, B. loose silhouette

Hornor, Benjamin 2, 60

Hornor, Benjamin, Jr. loose silhouette

Hornor, Benjamin C. 20, 63, 64

Hornor, Mary 1

Hornor, Rebecca 16, 57

Johnson, William 69

Levis, Eleanor 22

Minturn, Lydia 54

Morgan, Rebecca 33

Morrison, Elizabeth 12

Morrison, Evan 11, 21

Morrison, George 56

Morrison, Mary 39

Paxson, Ann J. 70

Peirson, Elizabeth 62

Pickering, Alice C. 6

Pickering, Charles 79

Pickering, Elihu 5, loose silhouette

Pickering, Samuel (Dr.) 72

Pleasants, Samuel 30

Randolph, Elizabeth 25, 61

Randolph, Jacob (Dr.) 74 [missing]

Randolph, Julianna 26

Redman, Elizabeth L. 10

Redman, John (Dr.) 29, 38

Roland, Mary 7

Roland, Sarah 8

Scull, Hope 48

Snowdon, Joseph 75

Snowdon, Myles 68

Snowdon, Rebecca 67

Stokes, Abigail 78

Thomson, Ann 52

Thomson, Hannah 51

Waln, Nicholas 37

Warner, George 40

West, Charles 35

Wickersham, Mary 45

Wickersham, Sarah R. 59

Yarnall, Benjamin H. 76

Yarnall, Sarah 13

Not identified: 44, 65, 77, two loose silhouettes