Rare Embroidered and Painted Silk Mourning Picture: To the Memory of the Illustrious Geo. Washington, Debby Bates, Massachusetts, dated 1800

Worked in silk, paint, and ink on silk; inscribed in the mat, Executed By Debby Bates, SEPT. 1800.

American Needlework Treasures: Samplers and Silk Embroideries from the Collection of Betty Ring at the Museum of American Folk Art (p. 61, fig. 99)

Possibly original frame and glass.
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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.

Debby may have pictured herself as she dressed for a Washington memorial service. Anne Jean Robbins, of Milton, was twelve when Washington died. She recalled being "dressed in white with a broad black ribbon around her straw hat, and a black sash around the waist" (Susan I. Lesley, Memoir of the Life of Mrs. Anne Jean Lyman (Cambridge, Mass., 1876, p. 31). Attributed to Debby Bates (c . 1732- 1805), who married Josiah Stedman in Boston in 1804. A similar memorial by Cynthia Dunbar of Concord and dedicated to Asa Dunbar is now at the Concord Antiquarian Museum, Concord, Massachusetts.