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(PRESIDENTS.) Auguste Edouart, artist. Silhouettes of President Monroe's daughter Maria Gouverneur and a cousin. Black paper silhouettes and manuscript caption tags mounted on paper, 9 3/4 x 6 3/4 and 11 3/4 x 5 3/4 inches to sight, in early 20th century frames showing captions and Arthur Vernay exhibit tags on verso; front captions foxed, exhibit tags worn, otherwise minimal wear and foxing. Not examined out of frames. New York, 24 April 1840
Auguste Edouart (1789-1861) was a French artist who toured the United States from 1839 to 1849, making silhouette portraits for the young nation's elite. He kept a set of carefully cataloged duplicates, two of which are offered here. Most notable is Maria Hester Monroe Gouverneur (1802-1850), third child of the late fifth president, James Monroe. In 1820, she became the first child of a president to be married in the White House, when she married her father's private secretary Samuel Laurence Gouverneur. They were fixtures of Manhattan high society until her return to Washington in 1840. This portrait was taken on Houston Street in New York. On the same day, her husband's cousin Gouverneur S. Bibby (1790-1872) of New York was also captured in shadow.
The background of these portraits is given in detail in "American Silhouettes by August Edouart: A Notable Collection of Portraits Taken Between 1839-1849" by Arthur S. Vernay. Vernay acquired the entire set of Edouart's reference copies and dispersed them after a 1913 exhibition in New York. His catalog lists both of these portraits on page 60, although the president's daughter is there misidentified as Mrs. Maria K. Gouverneur Bibby.
