Rare Needlework Sampler, Ann Hooton, Gloucester, New Jersey, Dated 1812

Worked with twisted silk threads and crinkled silk floss on linen in chain, tent, satin, split, outline, bullion, needle-weaving and cross-stitches. Inscribed: Wrought by Ann Hootton Daughter of/William and Hannah Hooton 1812/E S Schoolmistress: E.S. Stain at left, minor discoloration. 19 by 17 inches. (28 threads to the inch).

See catalogue note at sothebys.com

Somewhat dark, stain to right edge, with loss to top right corner.
In response to your inquiry, we are pleased to provide you with a general report of the condition of the property described above. Since we are not professional conservators or restorers, we urge you to consult with a restorer or conservator of your choice who will be better able to provide a detailed, professional report. Prospective buyers should inspect each lot to satisfy themselves as to condition and must understand that any statement made by Sotheby's is merely a subjective qualified opinion.
NOTWITHSTANDING THIS REPORT OR ANY DISCUSSIONS CONCERNING CONDITION OF A LOT, ALL LOTS ARE OFFERED AND SOLD "AS IS" IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE CONDITIONS OF SALE PRINTED IN THE CATALOGUE.

Exhibited and Literature: LACMA, pp. 125-126, fig. 60

A distinctive group of samplers worked in classrooms on the New Jersey side of the Delaware River were embellished with a bewildering array of densely worked Quaker motifs. Samplers related to the piece stitched by Ann Hooton compose a cohesive body of extraordinary work, one that surpasses most sampler embroideries known to have a New Jersey provenance. Characteristic of this group is the terraced pictorial setting-with a detailed house or building, trees, and a farmyard of birds and animals-and the distinctive, undulating border. Surviving examples of this extravagant sampler format attest to its enduring popularity from the 1820s into the 1830s. In the recent past, textile historians have directed their attention to schoolmistresses of Burlington County, where more than a few of the young embroiderers have been found. This sampler worked by Ann Hooton, who lived in Gloucester County in 1812, may be the earliest example of this New Jersey group. The sampler itself is replete with traditional Quaker motifs, but the border design is an unusual one.¹ Worked as a twisted ribbon, knotted with leaves, diminutive tulips, and button like flower-shapes that punctuate the pattern, the border weaves around three sides of the sampler. Across the top, color and texture reverse with each turn, changing from solid green floss to beige, patterned with dots of rust-colored bullion knots. The uppermost corners are adorned with birds. Border designs of similar samplers bearing later dates were worked in whirling waves of thin vines with leaf and flower decoration, such as that bordering the sampler worked by Martha Hooton-not related to Ann-in 1827.² One of the earliest examples was worked by Lydia Burroughs in 1814 at the Chesterfield School, a Quaker institution in New Jersey.³ It is possible that Ann's charming border design was her schoolmistress's version of a developing regional pattern. The most striking motif on Ann's sampler is the appearance of a seventeenth-century galleon, which would have been copied from a newspaper, broadside, or engraving, possibly during the War of 1812 (see below). Sails are unfurled, flags fly in all directions, a lantern swings from a post above the high, jutting afterdeck. American samplers featuring sailing ships are uncommon, for reasons not yet fully understood, but this one is cleverly arranged within the cluttered format.⁴ Ann Hooton, born July 16, 1799, was the first of twelve children born to William and Hannah Kay Hooton of Haddonfield, Gloucester County, New Jersey.⁵ Her maternal grandfather, Isaac Kay, was a leading citizen of the town.⁶ Ann married Reuben Haines (b. 1796) of Waterford Township, in what is now Camden County. Their engagement was celebrated in the Quaker meeting house at Haddonfield in 1820.⁷ Little is known about the education of girls in Ann's small New Jersey village. Early in the eighteenth century, Jonathan Bolton and his wife, Hannah, kept a "family school" for the children of Haddonfield, for which they received forty acres of land for life. Hannah Bolton probably instructed girls in rudimentary embroidery stitches. By 1786, a Quaker school was well established in the town, "wherein English Grammar, the Mathematics, Geography, and the Latin and French languages (by a French nobleman) are, or may be taught."⁸ Girls were frequently sent to attend the fashionable Philadelphia schools, for needlework was the specialty of the private boarding-school teacher. But the sampler worked by Ann Hooton is characteristic of documented regional New Jersey patterns, suggesting this splendid embroidery was the product of a local school, stitched under the watchful eyes of an as yet unidentified Haddonfield schoolmistress, whose initials are E. S. According to Quaker records, Reuben Haines was disowned by the Friends in 1856, and Ann Hooton Haines moved to the Upper Evesham Monthly Meeting in 1859.⁹  

 

1. Ring, "Samplers and Pictorial Needlework," 1425, 1426. 

2. Martha Hooton's sampler was in the Kapnek collection and is now in a private collection; see Krueger, Gallery of American Samplers, 69. 

3. The location of the Burroughs sampler is unknown; see Bolton and Coe, American Samplers, opp. 304, 381. The Chesterfield School is recorded as dating from 1795 to 1821. 

4. Ring, "Samplers and Silk Embroideries of Portland, Maine," 520. As an example of the custom, this engraving of a sailing vessel by James Akin, c. 1807, appears to have been copied in pencil, ink, and paint on Maine silk embroideries worked in Portland schools attended by local girls during the 1820s. 

5. Haddonfield Monthly Meeting Records of Birth and Deaths, 1690-1820, 142. 

6. This Is Haddonfield (Haddonfield, NJ: Historical Society of Haddonfield, NJ, 1963): 143. 

7. Haddonfield Monthly Meeting Records. The document is signed, customarily, by the forty-four members in attendance. 

8. This Is Haddonfield, 202, 203. 

9. Haddonfield Monthly Meeting Records.