'Miss Fanny Kemple' (sic) and 'L'assoupissement': Two lacquer snuff boxes, Stobwasser, Brunswick, circa 1835

circular, the first painted with a portrait of Frances Ann Kemble as Othello's Bianca, after Thomas Sully's painting of 1833, the second with a reclining lady with heavy eyelids, the first with lid and base numbered: 6279, the second with lid and base numbered: 7390, each lid titled, each base with Mark VII

The actress Fanny Kemble (1809-1893) was born in London into England's most prominent family of actors, which included her father, Charles Kemble.  She embarked on a two-year tour of America in 1832, during which time she was painted by Sully at the height of his career. 

It was also during this American tour that she met and married Pierce Butler of Philadelphia, who had extensive land holdings in the South and owned many slaves.  Fanny's abolitionist convictions, heightened after travelling to Georgia and seeing slavery first-hand, caused friction in the marriage.  Butler sued for divorce in 1848.  The remainder of Fanny's life was spent writing and performing Shakespearian readings on both continents before her death in London at age 83.

This same image of Fanny Kemble appears on a box in the Glanz Collection, illustrated D. Richter, Stobwasser: Lackkunst aus Braunschweig & Berlin, vol. I, 2005, no. 138.