A modest granite slab marks the grave of George Peter Alexander Healy, the internationally celebrated nineteenth century American portrait painter.[1] He is buried together with Louisa, his loyal wife of fifty-five years, near the eastern gate of the scenic lakeside Calvary Cemetery, located just north of Chicago. Engraved on the bronze plaque fitted into the couple’s stone is the following:

“George P.A. Healy, born in Boston, Massachusetts, July 15, 1813, died in Chicago, Illinois, June 24, 1894, and his wife, Louisa Phipps Healy, born in London, England, February 10, 1818, died in Chicago, Illinois, February 7, 1905.”[2]

Calvary Cemetery, consecrated by the Catholic Church in 1859,[3] was an appropriate burial site for the devout Catholic that Healy was. Family names of some of the artist’s many Chicagoan friends and sitters identify certain surrounding memorials. They represent one part of the greater Chicago society that welcomed Healy into its midst in 1855, and with whom he at various times lived, worked, mingled and joined together in giving shape to early Chicago history, and ultimately, to American history.

Throughout his life George Healy traveled frequently in the Eastern half of the United States and in Europe—a trait he may have inherited from his father, William Healy (1784-1834), whom Healy later identified as a “sailor.”[4] William Healy left his native Dublin, Ireland as a boy together with two brothers and their father in 1798 as a result of the “ruin” of their father by the rebellion of that year.[5] In London, William Healy became a midshipman with the East India Company.[6] Afterwards, in Boston, he became the captain of a “merchant vessel.” While in that city, he met the young Mary Hicks (c.1798-1836),[7] a Boston native of English descent. George Healy, both romantically and realistically recalled his father, and the next part of his father’s life:

“He was a bold-spirited, imprudent man, excellently well fitted for the adventurous life he led. During the war with Tripoli, finding that his vessel was on the point of being captured by a corsair’s craft, he caused all his men to land, remained himself till the last moment, blew up the ship, and barely escaped with his life. In 1812 he commanded another merchant vessel; all he possessed was invested in its cargo. An English privateer captured the ship, and sent its captain a prisoner to the island of Antiqua… when he was exchanged soon after, he returned to Boston and married without much thought for the future. My father was not suited for a landsman’s life; he was a sailor and nothing but a sailor, and each of his subsequent ventures proved disastrous.”[8]

William Healy was married to Mary Hicks in the Catholic church of Boston[9] on June 22, 1812, by the Rev. Francis A. Matignon.[10] William was Catholic, Mary, Protestant.[11] Their first child, George Peter Alexander Healy, was born on July 15, 1813. He was one of seven children—five of whom survived infancy. Healy later wrote that he was baptized by Rev. Cheverus.[12] Not long after George’s birth, the family moved to Albany, New York, where William worked in the “Intelligence Office,” and as a “grocer.”[13] In Albany, five children were born: William Jr. (1815-1815); John Reynolds (1816-1842); Ann Elizabeth (Agnes) (January 1818-1902); Thomas Cantwell (12/7/1820-12/10/1889); and William H. Birmingham (1822-1/7/1876).[14] The family moved back to Boston where their last child, Samuel, was born and died in the same year, 1824.[15] In Boston, William Healy may have returned to his occupation as sea captain.[16]

Among recollections of his youth, Healy later wrote that he owed the fact of his not becoming a cripple to his mother. When he was about twelve, after an illness which affected the Healy family, he was left with a limp. The doctors advised amputation of his leg. His mother decided to sit upon his leg instead, after which he was healed.[17] On June 17, 1825, Healy attended the celebration of the 50th anniversary of the Battle of Bunker Hill, one of the first battles of the Revolutionary War. Honored participants included the Marquis de Lafayette, and Daniel Webster.[18] Healy and Webster would become friends and Healy would later paint several portraits of the great nineteenth century statesman.

Healy linked his “inheritance” of a liking for painting to his grandmother, Mrs. Hicks, who painted watercolors.[19] He remembered looking at watercolors made by her, during her “journey among the West Indian Islands.”[20] He recalled, “the first time that I held a brush was when I was about sixteen years of age.”[21] After that time, as there were no academies or classes he might attend, he began copying prints, and “making likenesses of all who would consent to sit” for him.[22] He remembered the first “useful thing he did was to paint a portrait of the family’s butcher,” thereby helping to provide some meat for his poor family.[23] He later wrote that despite his family’s initial opposition, “when once my artistic vocation as a painter was made clear to me, I never hesitated a moment, I never looked back.”[24]

Another influence on Healy’s artistic development was that of the Stuart family. Before his marriage to Mary Hicks, William Healy had had his portrait painted by the illustrious American portrait painter, Gilbert Stuart (1755-1828).[25] George Healy also had contact with the Stuarts. Gilbert Stuart’s daughter, Jane (1812-1888), an artist, and a contemporary of George’s, took an interest in his artistic progress. She lent him a print of Guido Reni’s Ecce Homo to copy.[26] Healy’s copy of the print was sold by a bookseller to a Catholic priest for ten dollars and constituted one of Healy’s first sales.[27] Miss Stuart introduced him to the portrait painter, Thomas Sully (1783-1872), of Philadelphia in 1831. At the time, Sully was in Boston finishing a portrait of Col. Perkins, which the late Stuart had begun for the Boston Athenaeum.[28] Upon seeing Healy’s copy of one of Stuart’s portraits, and a work from nature, Sully advised Healy to become a painter.[29] Later, Healy recalled this as his “first serious encouragement” to pursue painting as a career.[30]

Thus encouraged, Healy recalled arranging for a “painting-room” in the home of merchant Richard Tucker in the fall of 1831.[31] Healy traded his landlord rent for portraits of his son, Charles Tucker, and son-in-law, John Henry Gray. Healy remembered these two portraits as the first he exhibited, and that they “attracted some attention.”[32]

Healy first exhibited at the annual exhibition of the Boston Athenaeum in the spring of 1832. The exhibition was held from May 14 through September 1.[33] He probably exhibited four portraits: Portrait of a Lady; Portrait; G. Flagg; and Portrait of a Boy.[34] G. Flagg was a fellow artist, who also exhibited several works at the Athenaeum in 1832. The two paintings identified as, Portrait, and Portrait of a Boy were probably the portraits of Healy’s landlord’s family, John Henry Gray and Charles Tucker, as mentioned above. Another portrait painted by the artist in 1832 was that of Moses Pond (1799-1870) (Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, NY).[35]

George was not the only member of the family to show his work at the Boston Athenaeum in 1832. His younger brother, Thomas Cantwell, also exhibited a picture, Jael and Sisera, identified in the catalogue as, by and owned by “T.C. Healey, a lad 11 yrs. of age.”[36] Another brother—who did not exhibit at the Athenaeum in 1832—John Reynolds, was apparently also an artist.[37]

Healy recalled that around the time of the exhibition in 1832, he was painting a portrait of Lieutenant Gershom J.Van Brunt[38] and expressed to his sitter his desire to paint a woman’s portrait,[39] having never done so apart from family members.[40] Van Brunt suggested the artist ask Mrs. Harrison Gray Otis (Elizabeth Henderson Boardman) (1796-1873), a young widow, and the Mayor’s daughter-in-law,[41] to sit for a portrait. She consented, and the shy Healy “audaciously” painted her laughing. Healy recalled, “from that time ‘Little Healy,’ as people called me, became known.”[42] Afterwards, he recalled that he was able to pay his rent, other expenses and also to “help toward the support of my family.”[43]

In 1833, Healy was listed in Stimpson’s Boston Directory, as a “portrait painter,” at

13 School Street.[44] Portraits painted by him around this time included that of David Henshaw, a politician, Father Taylor, a family friend (Museum of Fine Arts, Boston), and Samuel Dorr (1774-1844), a merchant [45] (Boston Athenaeum, Boston). He exhibited one portrait at the Boston Athenaeum in 1833, that of the Right Rev. Bishop Fenwick.[46] Despite early successes, Healy later recalled:

“I was, however, quite aware that, in spite of great natural facility, I had still everything to learn. I had had no master; what I knew I had acquired by dint of hard work, with the occasional advice of some older artist, but with no serious training. My one object was to become a student in a regular art school. But this could only be accomplished after I had scraped together not only money enough to take me to Europe and to help toward my support there, but to leave a sufficient sum with my mother to support her for a year or two, until I should be able to earn something on the other side of the big ocean.”[47]

After accumulating “a handsome sum of money” to leave with his mother, and one thousand dollars for himself,[48] Healy sailed for France in April of 1834, on the Sully.[49] He later recalled the last portraits he painted in Boston before departing for Europe were of the Appleton Sisters, Mary (later, Mrs. MacIntosh), and Frances (later, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow’s second wife)[50] (both, The Longfellow House, Cambridge, MA). Before departing from the port of New York on the Sully, Healy met with the artist and inventor, Samuel Finley Breese Morse (1791-1872), apparently to get a letter of introduction to the Marquis de Lafayette,[51] who was in Paris.

Healy never saw his parents again. In the month after George sailed for France, his father died of consumption on May 5, 1834. He was 50 years old, and was buried on May 6 in the “South Boston Cemetery, R.C.” [52] His mother died two years later. While abroad, during the month of May in 1834, several of Healy’s paintings—all privately owned by others—were exhibited in Boston, including A Portrait of a Lady, at Harding’s Gallery,[53] and four at the Boston Athenaeum’s eighth annual exhibition, including Mrs. Boyden, Mr. Homer, Portrait, and G.L. Brown.[54]

Upon his arrival in Paris, Healy was unable to see the ailing Marquis de Lafayette, who died on May 20, 1834.[55] He was also unable to see his Boston patron, Mrs. Otis, who, together with her two sons, had recently left Paris for Switzerland.[56] Healy enrolled in the studio of the French history painter, Baron Antoine Jean Gros (1771-1835). His study with Gros was to be his only period of “extended training under a teacher,” as his granddaughter, Marie de Mare, later wrote of her grandfather in her biography of him.[57]

At Baron Gros’s studio, Healy met the French painter, Thomas Couture (1815-1879). As Healy stated, Couture became “one of my best and dearest friends.”[58] Healy also met the student, Oliver Frazer (1808-1864), a painter from Kentucky in Gros’s studio. Interestingly, in his History of the Rise and Progress of the Arts of Design in the United States, first published in 1834, William Dunlap refers to the young Healy as the teacher of the slightly older Oliver Frazer.[59]

Copying old master paintings was considered part of a nineteenth century artist’s education, and Healy spent much time doing so. While copying Correggio’s Mystical Marriage of Saint Catherine, at the Louvre in 1834, an English couple stopped to chat. Not long after, on a trip to Italy that autumn, he again encountered the couple, at a stage-coach stop at Alexandria. They introduced themselves as Sir Arthur and Lady Faulkner and were to become Healy’s friends and patrons. They had learned of George Healy from their friend, Mrs. Otis, in Switzerland, and invited him to tour Italy with them.[60] Together the three visited Turin, Genoa, Siena, Florence, Rome and Naples. They spent five weeks in Florence, where Healy made copies of Titian’s Venus, and other paintings.[61] The Faulkners invited Healy to visit them in London at some point.[62]

After his tour of Italy, Healy spent two months in Geneva, Switzerland. There he painted many portraits of Englishmen, and of Mrs. Otis and her family.[63] Before Healy’s return to Paris in July of 1835,[64] Baron Gros had committed suicide, on June 25, 1835.[65] Healy took a studio in Paris, encouraged to do so by a new friend, Edme Savinien Dubourjal (1795-1865), a miniature painter. Healy gave painting lessons, painted portraits,[66] painted from life in the evenings and copied paintings in the Louvre.[67]

Healy was interested in selling his copies of paintings. Earlier, during the spring of 1835, three had been exhibited and listed for sale at the ninth annual exhibition of paintings at the Boston Athenaeum. They were, The Marriage at Cana, Head of our Saviour, after Guido, and Prince of Orange Going out in the Morning, from Cuyp.[68] Other copies of paintings made by Healy in 1835 included, a Study from Paul Veronese, The Entombment from Titian, and A copy from Velasquies (sic), Infanta of Spain.[69]

During the winter of 1835-1836, Healy’s mother[70] became ill, but she apparently did not mention her illness to him.[71] In his letters to her during this time, he told of a group portrait of Mr. James John Cox (of Philadelphia), his Children and his Sister, Mrs. Sitgreaves,[72] which he was painting, and he sent one of his Italian sketches to his sister, Agnes, for her birthday in January of 1836. His mother wrote him, “we hope you will have many commissions in England, but not so many that you cannot return to us by next summer.”[73] Unfortunately his mother did not live to see the next summer. She died of consumption on February 13, 1836, and was buried on February 16 in the “South Burial Ground, no. 50” in Boston. She was 38 years old when she died.[74]

In the next month, Healy exhibited for the first time at the annual Paris Salon, which opened at the Musée Royal, on March 1, 1836.[75] Back in Boston, at almost the same time, four of his paintings were exhibited at the Athenaeum, that of S. Grosvenor, Costume the Taste of the Artist, H.G. Otis, Jr., Titian’s Daughter,[76] and for a second time, Prince of Orange Going out in the Morning, From Cuyp. In 1836 Healy apparently also made another copy of a painting by Titian, in addition to “a study from the daughter of my landlady.”[77]

Healy recalled that his first visit to London was in the spring of 1836.[78] He was invited by his friends, Sir Arthur and Lady Faulkner, to paint their portraits.[79] In London Healy saw the ‘last exhibition ever held in Somerset House.”[80] Through the Faulkners, Healy was given the opportunity to paint a portrait of the English reformer, Francis Place (1771-1854).[81] Place was to prove a friend to Healy in the next year.

Beginning in the summer of 1836 Healy went on a sketching tour of Switzerland and France with two French artists.[82] Before that time, Healy had written to Francis Place from Paris, expressing his desire to, “make one more effort in London,” and asking Place if the English historian, Joseph Hume (1777-1855)—who had liked Healy’s portrait of Place— could be persuaded to have his own portrait painted. While in France on the sketching trip, the artist received word from Place of Hume’s agreement and Healy returned to London to execute the work in January and stayed in the city the remainder of the year.[83]

He rented a painting room at 28 Grafton Street, Fitzroy Square, [84] and presented himself to Hume on the twenty-second to fulfill his portrait commission.[85] Healy later recalled, “this was the beginning of my real career as an artist.”[86] Francis Place again showed his friendship during the summer of 1837. Healy told him he had “not a pound in the world to bless myself,” and Place gave him twenty pounds, and promised 200 more if needed.[87] According to Marie de Mare, this “marked the turning point of Healy’s fortunes.”[88] Healy invited his friend and fellow artist, Edme Savinien Dubourjal to join him in London, as there was much work available for both painters. Dubourjal took a painting room “on the same floor as George’s.”[89] By the end of the year, the two painters had become “socially popular,” according to de Mare.[90] Besides being a professionally important time in Healy’s life, it was also a personally important time, for, as he later recalled, “It was while I was at work in London that I first met my wife.”[91] He met his future spouse, Louisa Phipps, through an introduction by Andrew Stevenson, American minister to France, to James Hanley, an American inventor, whose English wife was Louisa’s sister.[92] Dubourjal painted a watercolor of Louisa,[93] and, at some point, Healy and Dubourjal were invited to Mr. and Mrs. Phipps’ home where they heard Louisa sing.[94]

While living in London, Healy exhibited one portrait, Portraits de famille, at the Paris Salon of 1837.[95] Two of his paintings were exhibited at the Boston Athenaeum in 1837: one, of M. Valpeau, Professor of Surgery in the Medical School, Paris, the other, of G.Gabriel Andral, Professor of the Medical School, Paris (1797-1876).[96] Two other paintings by Healy dated 1837 are, Girl with Pitcher, a study “completed in four hours,”[97] and, Alexander Van Rensselaer (1814-1878) (Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, NY).[98]

In late 1837,[99] Healy may have begun painting the naturalist, John James Audubon (1785-1851) (Museum of Science, Science Park, Boston), who was visiting in London. Healy sought him out, hoping to paint his portrait, and Audubon agreed to sit.[100] To Audubon, Healy revealed his love for an “English girl.”[101] Healy’s portrait, which shows the artist/naturalist seated holding a rifle in his left hand and resting his face against his right hand, was finished early in 1838, in time to be exhibited at the Royal Academy, at the annual spring exhibition. Thomas Sully, in London in March of 1838 on a commission from the “St. George Society” to paint Queen Victoria’s portrait,[102] called upon Healy, and seeing his portrait of Audubon, told Healy, “you have no reason to regret having followed the advice I gave you to make painting your profession some years ago.”[103]

On February 8, 1838, Healy wrote from London, to his friend and fellow artist, Francis Alexander, in Boston, to thank him for “the remarkably clever painted head of my sweet sister Agnes,” and to tell Alexander the current and past year’s state of his affairs.[104] He said that at the Countess of Essex’s request, he had recently, on New Year’s Day, delivered a letter and his “little picture” of her to the Duke of Sutherland. Healy had told the Duke he planned to stay in London for three years, and “might become a student at the Royal Academy where he had the friendship of Wilkie and Leslie.”[105]

Healy mentioned in this letter to Alexander, that he had painted John A. Braham, a singer, and that Lady Agnes Buller wanted him to paint “some friends” in the spring. In a postscript, Healy revealed he had become a student at the British Academy and had received a favorable notice for a picture on exhibition:

“P.S. My dear Friend, Since I wrote the foregoing three pages, some things have changed. Lady Essex is dead. Her Ladyship has left the picture I painted for her to the Duke of Sutherland. My drawing from the Antique has admitted me as a student of the Academy; my picture of a Jew has got a good place in the British Institution; the following is an extract from the Morning Herald: ‘No. 91. Study of a Jew by Healy, painted with a firm, free pencil, the tone and color good.’ This is the first public mention of my name in England. Sully and Osgood have pictures in the same exhibition.”[106]

In May, 1838, Healy exhibited six portraits at the annual exhibition of the Royal Academy,[107] but none at the Boston Athenaeum, nor at the Paris Salon. One portrait by his brother, Thomas Cantwell, however was exhibited at the Paris Salon of that year.[108] At Healy’s invitation, his brother, Thomas Cantwell had come to Paris. He lived there for about a year before returning home to Lowell, Massachusetts,[109] sometime in the latter half of 1839.

According to Marie de Mare, Healy and Dubourjal attended a ceremony on May 24, 1838—Queen’s Victoria’s birthday—to launch the steamship, British Queen.[110] There, Andrew Stevenson, American Minister to England (1836-1841), introduced Healy to General Lewis Cass, Minister to the Court of France (1836-1842). Stevenson asked Healy to paint a portrait of the Frenchman, Marshal Nicolas Jean de Dieu Soult, Duke of Dalmatia (1769-1851),[111] who was to represent King Louis Philippe at the Queen’s coronation at Westminster in June. The Stevensons gave Healy admission tickets to the coronation ceremony, but instead, Healy accepted an invitation, received on June 27 from Lady Agnes Buller to attend the ceremony on June 28.[112]

After the Coronation, Healy visited Antwerp to paint copies of old master paintings, including works by Rembrandt,[113] and Rubens.[114] He planned to spend ten days, but increased the duration of his trip to six weeks. During his travels, Healy wrote to General Cass, inquiring how he might obtain a sitting for a portrait of Marshal Soult for Andrew Stevenson. According to one source, Cass replied, “Come to Paris, and I will do what I can to induce the Marshal to sit for you; in the meantime, I wish you to paint myself and family, for, although young in years, your fame has reached me.”[115] Healy apparently returned to Paris to begin painting Cass (Detroit Historical Museum)[116] the day after he received his letter.[117] While painting Cass,[118] his sitter informed Healy he would like him to paint Louis Philippe, King of the French.[119]

Healy later recalled that, after Louis Philippe saw Healy’s portrait of Cass at the Paris Salon exhibition of 1839, [120] and learned from Cass that Healy was at the time in London, the King told Cass that, “…if he will come to Paris, I am willing to sit to him.”[121] Healy remembered, “naturally he was soon at his Majesty’s orders”[122] to paint the King’s portrait for General Cass.[123] According to de Mare, Healy received this letter from Cass in July 1839.[124] Healy recalled that Cass, “presented me to the King, and remained during the whole of the first sitting.”[125] During that sitting, when Healy advanced towards the King with a steel “compass” to measure his face, a courtier, thinking he meant harm, pushed him aside. Healy wrote that the King smiled, and said, “Mr. Healy is a republican, it is true, but he is an American. I am quite safe with him.”[126]

According to Marie de Mare, before returning to Paris to paint Louis Philippe’s portrait, Healy and Louisa Phipps were married.[127] Louisa, who was Protestant at the time, refused to be married in a Catholic Church,[128] so the couple was married in Saint Pancras Parish Church, on Euston Road, in the County of Middlesex, England on July 23, 1839. James and Mary Ann Hanley—Louisa’s brother-in-law and sister—stood as witnesses.[129] After the wedding the couple traveled to Paris, and lived in one room, attached to a painting room, on the “rue de l’Ouest, now Rue d’Assas, near the Luxembourg Gardens,”[130] for “nearly a year.”[131] Afterwards, they moved to “a rather better place …on the other side of the river.”[132] In his autobiography, Healy wrote that in the early years of their marriage there were great contrasts between their own modest lifestyle and that of the affluent lifestyles of his sitters. In spite of much time spent apart over the years—as Healy traveled and worked on commissions—theirs was a felicitous marriage of mutual devotion and loyalty. According to Healy’s daughter, Mary Bigot: “my parents were lovers, even in old age.”[133]

In 1839, besides painting Louis Philippe for General Cass, Healy painted portraits of Andrew Stevenson (1784-1857) Minister to Great Britain (Virginia Historical Society), his wife, Sarah Coles Stevenson (1789-1848) (Virginia Historical Society),[134] Mrs. Benjamin James Adams (Caroline Throckmorton),[135] and Mrs. Cass[136] (unlocated: copy, 1860, Detroit Historical Museum).[137] Healy’s portrait of Mrs. Cass was viewed with favor by the French Queen at the Palais des Tuileries in November. M. Delort, Aide-de-Camp to the King, wrote to General Cass on November 14, 1839:

“The Queen has seen the portrait of Mrs. Cass. Her Majesty has deigned to give me the agreeable task of telling you that she was pleased with this lovely work, which does credit to the young artist, Mr. Healy, who is the author of it …. P.S. Please be so kind as to let Mr. Healy know that he may collect Mrs. Cass’ portrait.”[138]

In February 1840, the Healys went to London, where their first child, Arthur Faulkner was born in March. He was named after Sir Arthur Faulkner, who, together with his wife, “promised to stand as godparents.”[139] Healy returned to Paris, leaving his wife with her mother, Mrs. Phipps. In the same month, March, Marshal Soult was out of office— replaced by Louis Adolphe Thiers (1797-1877) as minister of foreign affairs—and thus available to have his portrait painted by Healy for Andrew Stevenson.[140] Healy’s portrait of Marshal Soult (full-length sketch, Columbus Museum of Art, OH),[141] was finished in time to be exhibited at the Royal Academy in March, 1840, together with a portrait of the founder of the Boston Public Library, Joshua Bates (1788-1864), and another portrait.[142]

Healy’s painting of Mrs. Cass was shown at the Paris Salon of 1840.[143] For it, the artist won his first Salon prize, a third class medal,[144] from the King.[145] Healy wrote in his Reminiscences that it was “the first public recompense accorded” to him.[146] Sometime after the Paris Salon of 1840, King Louis Philippe made arrangements for Healy to copy English paintings at Windsor Castle.[147] In England, Sir Arthur Faulkner—who was the physician to the Duke of Sussex[148]—arranged for the Duke to sit for his portrait.[149] Mrs. Andrew Stevenson, too, helped arrange for the sitting. On June 25, 1840, she wrote to the Duchess of Inverness (the Duke’s wife) to ask for patronage for Healy:

“I have just seen Mr. Healy, a young American Artist, who tells me His Royal Highness has kindly promised Sir … Faulkner to see him some day soon, and permit him to take with him some of his pictures. He is a young artist of great promise and merit, and at some future day, may become the Lawrence of America …. May I ask your Grace’s kind and benevolent patronage for my young countryman, who is, I assure you, most worthy of it …”[150]

At some point, Sussex sat for Healy.[151] As Queen Victoria’s uncle, he was a sitter of consequence.

Healy later recalled that, “events seemed about to shape my career into that of an English artist,” and that his portrait of the Duke, was “successful, and brought him various commissions and some notice.”[152] He worked on portraits of Lord and Lady Waldegrave, who invited him and his wife on an outing to their country seat, Strawberry Hill.[153] Other of Healy’s many English commissions included portraits of General Charles Richard Fox,[154] a group portrait of the children of Tyrone Power, the actor,[155] Lady Agnes Buller, and the Master of Grant,[156] among others.

By 1841, with many portrait commissions in England and France, and his work on display in Boston, London and Paris, Healy was a vital and important member of the American artist colony in Paris. He extended assistance to fellow American painters in that city, including, Robert Cooke (c.1810-c.1843),[157] James De Veaux (1812-1844), Benjamin Champney (1817-1907), and William Morris Hunt (1824-1879).[158] Healy, possibly his wife Louisa, and a number of American artists, are depicted in the painting, A Studio Reception, Paris, 1841 (Albany Institute of History and Art, New York), by Thomas Pritchard Rossiter.[159] Another representation of the twenty-eight year old painter, during this time, is a self portrait (Redwood Library and Athenaeum, Newport, RI).[160]

Possibly in May or early June of 1841, Healy traveled with his wife and small son to Paris from London. In a letter written on June 7 to Mrs. Atkinson, from Paris, Rue St. Lazare 50, he mentioned his family’s “pleasant passage” to Paris by way of Havre, and that they had “not yet changed their residence.”[161] In the same letter, Healy wrote that, “Guizot gave me a sitting the other day and is to sit in the morning.”

The sitter Healy referred to in his letter was, Francois Pierre Guillaume Guizot (1787-1874) (full-length portrait, 94” x 56”, 1841, National Museum of American Art); (full-length 32 ½” x 21”, Santa Barbara Museum of Art, CA), the French Minister of Foreign Affairs at the time,[162] and successor to Louis-Adolphe Thiers.[163] As was his custom, Healy painted a smaller study version of the painting, for his own use.[164] In 1839, Guizot had written a biographical introduction to the French edition of Jared Sparks’ Life of Washington, originally published in Boston between 1834 and 1837.[165] A group of Americans fans commissioned Healy to paint Guizot’s portrait for presentation to President John Tyler, “as a gift to the nation.”[166] At the National Institute for the Promotion of Science, Washington, D.C.,[167] Guizot’s portrait was fittingly hung beside a full-length portrait of George Washington.[168]

Louis Philippe (1773-1850), King of the French, came to power after the revolution in France of July 1830 ended the reign of Charles X. Louis Philippe’s reign, known as the July Monarchy, lasted from 1830 until his forced abdication in February of 1848, after yet another revolution. The King spoke fluent English, for prior to his reign he had lived as an exile in England, and, from c.1796 to 1799,[169] in the United States, together with his two brothers. In the United States he had visited Louisiana,[170] and had lived in Boston, where he taught French. In Philadelphia, he met Gilbert Stuart, who was at work on a portrait of George Washington. The King had also visited General and Mrs. Washington at Mount Vernon.[171] Louis Philippe was interested in the ideas of democracy, and had decided in 1833 to make the former royal residence, Versailles, a museum dedicated to “all the glories of France,”[172] and to include a series of portraits of French or foreign princes, artists, academicians, soldiers, etc.[173]

In his Reminiscences, Healy recalled one morning, probably in February of 1842,[174] Louis Philippe sent for him.[175] The King told Healy that he, the King, had been seen,

“in good company last night, at the grand ball given by General Cass to commemorate the birthday of General Washington, hanging, as I did, between the portraits of that great man and M. Guizot.”[176]

When asked, Healy told the King that he had painted his copy of George Washington, for Cass, “from an engraving in the life written by Sparks.”[177] The King then commissioned Healy to copy Stuart’s original portrait of Washington for his “historical gallery at Versailles.” With this commission, Healy returned to the United States in April[178] of 1842; his first return since leaving eight years earlier, in 1834.[179]

He traveled alone, probably because a second child, Agnes—named after his sister—was born in London, on February 16, 1842.[180] Before departing for the United States on the Caledonia,[181] Healy visited Edward Everett (1794-1865), Andrew Stevenson’s successor to the position of United States minister to Great Britain (1841-1845), with a message from General Cass asking Everett to introduce the artist to Everett’s friends in the U.S.[182] Everett agreed, and wrote to his sister on April 16, telling her about Healy’s commission from the King to paint a copy of Washington’s portrait “in the President’s house” for Versailles.[183] Healy painted a portrait of Everett’s daughter, Charlotte Everett,[184] and at some point, a portrait of Edward Everett (Newberry Library, Chicago).

The year 1842 was a watershed year for Healy. Family events that year included the birth of his second child, Agnes, in London, as mentioned above, and the death of his brother, John Reynolds in Lowell, Massachusetts.[185] Healy also received a commission from American subscribers to paint a life portrait of President John Tyler. Healy’s two presidential portraits painted in 1842—a copy of the first president, and a life portrait of the tenth president, then in office—were to be the first of many presidential portraits he would paint during his career.

Arriving in Boston on May 5, 1842,[186] he viewed four of his works including the life portrait of Audubon “by gas light,” at the Boston Athenaeum where it had been sent the previous year.[187] While yet in Boston, Healy visited his brother Thomas Cantwell, his patron and friend, Mrs. Otis—who invited him to stay at her home—the Tucker family,[188] and the artist, Washington Allston (1779-1843).[189] After Boston, Healy stopped in New York, where one of his paintings was on exhibition at the National Academy of Design.[190] Afterwards, he traveled to Philadelphia, where he visited Thomas Sully. In Baltimore, Healy visited his sister, Agnes. By May 18, Healy had reached his destination, Washington.[191]

He was still in Washington at the end of May when he received a letter written on behalf of subscribers who were members of the National Institution, requesting portraits of the President of the United States and of William Campbell Preston, for the National Institution’s gallery.[192] On June 7, Healy wrote to a friend he had his copy of George Washington, “nearly finished and had promised the King that he would finish the head from the original in Boston.”[193] He also wrote that he was “engaged to complete his whole length of the King for that show of modern pictures,” and that his portrait of Guizot, painted the previous year, had “reached the city.”[194] A highly appreciative article about the Guizot painting, its painter, and patron, appeared in a Washington newspaper in June.[195]

As requested, Healy painted President Tyler (1842, Corcoran Gallery of Art, Washington, DC; 1859, National Portrait Gallery, Washington, DC; White House, Washington, DC), and additionally, two of the President’s daughters, Alice and Elizabeth.[196] Also, as requested, the artist painted a portrait of William Campbell Preston (1794-1850) (National Museum of American Art, Washington, DC), Senator from South Carolina. It is possible that during this time Healy painted companion portraits of Daniel Webster (January 18, 1782-October, 24, 1852), Secretary of State, and Lord Ashburton (copies of each, in the New York Historical Society, New York, NY). Webster and Ashburton were politically prominent in 1842, negotiating a treaty concerning boundaries between Canada and Maine, from April to August 9, 1842, at which time the Treaty of Washington, or, “Webster-Ashburton Treaty,” was signed.[197]

Upon his return to London, Healy completed the copy of George Washington by Gilbert Stuart (full-length; Musée National du Château de Versailles, France).[198] On November 1, 1842, he visited Edward Everett, in regard to the copy. After his visit, Everett wrote to the French Ambassador, “requesting him to claim the picture of Washington as the property of the King of France.”[199] Sometime in 1842, Healy painted Euphemia White Van Rensselaer (Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, NY), a young American woman visiting in Paris.[200]

On February 19, 1843, Healy’s copy of Stuart’s portrait of George Washington,[201] officially entered Louis Philippe’s art collection in Versailles.[202] In the same month Healy was reported in a newspaper article to be painting portraits in New Orleans, where he may have spent time with his brother, Thomas Cantwell.[203] While in the United States in 1843, Healy also worked in Boston where he painted portraits of the historian William Hickling Prescott (1796-1859), after asking him to sit,[204] and a Boston merchant, Thomas B. Wales.[205] He also painted a double portrait for Wales, one of four paintings by Healy exhibited at the Boston Athenaeum in 1843.[206] In London, a family portrait, Happy Moments, was exhibited at the Royal Academy.[207]

In 1843 Healy copied English portraits for Louis Philippe at Windsor and at Buckingham Palace.[208] According to a letter written by Healy on October 7, 1843, to King, the artist, Louis Philippe was so pleased with Healy’s copy of Washington that he commissioned him to return to the United States in April to “copy portraits of our distinguished Revolutionary characters for the same gallery.” [209] Healy added that he would have to travel alone because before then his family would have increased again. On December 8, 1843, their third child, Mary, was born in Paris.[210]

Healy may have worked in the United States in 1844 from April until July, at which time Dubourjal joined him.[211] It is possible that Healy attended exhibitions of his portraits in Boston and New York. In Boston, three portraits, including one of Lord Ashburton, were exhibited at the third exhibition of the Boston Artists’ Association at Harding’s Gallery,[212] and four pictures were exhibited at the Boston Athenaeum, including one of Marshal Soult.[213] In New York, one portrait was exhibited at the National Academy of Design.[214] As was not unusual for Healy by this time, his works were on exhibition in the same year in the United States, and in Europe. In 1844, eight paintings by Healy were exhibited at the Paris Salon[215] and five at the Royal Academy, including portraits of Lord Ashburton, Andrew Stevenson, and His Majesty Louis Philippe.[216]

In July of 1844, Healy may have been back in England, copying portraits at Windsor Castle, including a portrait of William IV, King of England (1765-1837), for Louis-Philippe’s gallery.[217] On August 17, 1844, twelve copies of English portraits by Healy entered into the Versailles collection.[218] Healy apparently continued painting copies of portraits for Versailles[219] from July of 1844 to February of the following year, for on February 7, 1845, eleven more of his copies of English portraits formally entered Louis Philippe’s Versailles Gallery.[220]

Sometime in 1845, the Healy family moved from Paris to Versailles. Louisa’s recently widowed mother, Mrs. Phipps, moved with them.[221] At the Paris Salon, which opened on March 15, 1845, at the Musée Royal, three portraits by Healy, including one of Louis Philippe, were exhibited.[222] Upon hearing the former president Andrew Jackson (1767-1845) was seriously ill, the king sent Healy to the United States to paint Jackson’s portrait, and the portraits of other American statesmen, in the spring of 1845.[223] Healy arrived at Jackson’s home, at the Hermitage in Tennessee, in time to paint two portraits of Jackson (Jackson family; Musée national du Château de Versailles, France; replica, Corcoran Gallery of Art, Washington, DC), and one full-length portrait of Mrs. Jackson, Jr.[224] Jackson was reported to have commented that he considered Healy’s portrait of him “the most perfect representation I have ever seen.”[225] Healy witnessed General Jackson’s death on June 8, 1845.[226]

Healy next went to Ashland, Kentucky, to the home of American statesman, Henry Clay (1777-1852) to paint his portrait.[227] He dated each of two Clay portraits, July 26, 1845 (Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, Richmond, VA; Musée national du Château de Versailles, France).[228] While at Ashland, Oliver Frazer—who had studied with Healy in 1834 in Paris, and who was now visiting Ashland—invited Healy to stay with him and to use his studio in Lexington.[229] While a guest of Frazer’s, Healy painted portraits of Mrs. Frazer[230] and of Mrs. Matthew H. Jouett, widow of the painter. Before traveling to Boston to paint a portrait of John Quincy Adams, Healy received portrait commissions in Louisville, Kentucky.[231] At some point in 1845, before or after painting Clay’s portrait, Healy apparently worked in New Orleans with this brother, Thomas.[232]

Friend Edme Savinien Dubourjal was in Boston, and had prepared a studio for Healy before his arrival in that city.[233] On or by September 3, John Quincy Adams gave Healy his first sitting (Musée national du Château de Versailles, France). On September 23, 1845, Healy wrote to his wife that the Adams portrait was finished.[234] Adams’ impression of his portrait changed over the course of a month. At first he wrote, “Healy’s is such a picture of naked nature that I cannot look at it without shame….” But Adams grew to appreciate it, and later wrote, “Mr. Healy’s picture is the strongest likeness of me that ever was painted.”[235] While in Boston, Healy also painted other portraits, including those of James T. Field and of the author, George Ticknor Curtis (1791-1871).[236]

In October and November of 1845, Healy worked on three portrait commissions of Daniel Webster for Louis Philippe (Musée national du Château de Versailles, France),[237] for Lord Ashburton, and for the Hone Club, New York (National Portrait Gallery, Washington, DC). On October 3, [238] and November 7, 1845, Healy was in Marshfield, Massachusetts, painting portraits at Webster’s home.[239] On November 12, 1845, Philip Hone and two friends met with Healy in Boston about the portrait of Webster, commissioned by the fifteen members of the Hone Club. Healy showed them a sketch of Webster under the “Marshfield Tree,” expressed his pleasure with the “job” and conveyed the information that Webster too was “not displeased” to be the subject.[240] Healy’s portrait of Webster arrived at the Hone Club, from Washington, at the end of April, 1846.[241]

Healy’s fourth child, George, was born, possibly early in 1846, in Versailles, while Healy was in the United States.[242] On January 11, 1846, Healy and Dubourjal traveled from Philadelphia to Baltimore.[243] On January 15, in Washington, President Polk first sat for Healy. Polk’s final sitting in 1846 was on April 6 (Musée national du Château de Versailles, France;[244] Corcoran Gallery of Art, Washington, DC;[245] James K. Polk Memorial Association, Columbia, TN).[246] During the last sitting, Dubourjal also painted a watercolor of the President.[247] At some point in 1846, Healy also painted Mrs. Polk’s portrait (James K. Polk Memorial Association, Columbia, TN).[248] In the middle of the year, Healy painted portraits, for Louis Philippe, of Vice-President John Caldwell Calhoun (1782-1850) on June 11,[249] and Daniel Webster on July 19, 1846.[250] In addition to the above, Healy painted Geroge Perkins Marsh (Hood Museum of Art, Dartmouth College, Hanover, NH), and a full-length portrait of Nathan Appleton (1779-1861) (City of Lowell, MA).[251]

Healy returned to France from the United States sometime before October of 1846. On October 10, eighteen portraits of Americans by Healy entered Louis Philippe’s gallery at Versailles. Of these, twelve were copies, and six were from life—the first life portraits by Healy to enter Versailles. Of the eighteen, six were of presidents.[252]

Healy recalled that while in the United States he first had the idea for his historical group portrait representing the The Hon. Daniel Webster Replying to Hon. Robert Y. Hayne in the U.S. Senate, Jan. 26 and 27, 1830[253] (Faneuil Hall, Boston, MA; sketch, destroyed, Chicago fire, 1871), which was completed in 1851. He wrote:

“while executing the orders of my royal patron, my work brought me in contact with the most celebrated of our public men. It was then that I first conceived the idea of grouping them together in a large historical picture. I chose as my subject ‘Webster Replying to Hayne’.”[254]

In October 1846 Louis Philippe gave permission to Healy to return to the United States to work on Webster Replying to Hayne.[255] Probably around this time the King also approved the idea for another historical composition which Healy proposed, that of Franklin Pleading the Cause of the American Colonies before Louis XVI[256] (destroyed in Chicago Fire of 1871).[257] While at Versailles Healy made a sketch (American Philosophical Society, Philadelphia, PA) of Franklin before Louis XVI. To aid in painting the picture, the King had documents relating to the historic event made available to Healy.[258] In the end, however, neither picture entered the King’s collection, for his reign ended in 1848, before they were completed.

On October 20, 1846, Healy was once again bound for the United States, this time with his wife, Louisa—for whom it was a first trip to America—via the Britania.[259] Their four children remained in Versailles with Mrs. Phipps.[260] The couple had planned to be in the United States for about a year,[261] but stayed a few months longer, until June of 1848. The extended stay was probably due to the birth of their fifth child.

The Healys were in New York in April of 1847, where they met Louisa’s sister, brother-in-law, James Hanley, and niece, Emily.[262] Although works by Healy were not exhibited at the National Academy of Design in 1847, he did apparently visit the exhibition.[263] After New York, the Healy’s traveled to Washington, stopping to visit the Sullys in Philadelphia, and Healy’s sister, Agnes, in Baltimore.[264] They then returned north to Boston, where Louisa met Mrs. Otis, Daniel Webster, and others. Webster introduced Healy to Charles Goodyear,[265] whose portrait Healy later painted. In Boston Healy painted a portrait of the writer, Nathanial Hawthorne (New Hampshire Historical Society, Concord, NH), commissioned by the author’s friend, Franklin Pierce.[266] Healy also recalled painting Ticknor’s portrait for the Webster Replying to Hayne, in the same year he painted Hawthorne.[267] Healy wrote to Henry Wheaton on July 24, 1847, from Boston to say that he had received a commission to paint Wheaton’s portrait, which he would be able to do after September 1. Healy had “engagements” in Newport, and planned to spend the month of August there with his wife.[268]

Healy continued accumulating individual portraits for his Webster Replying to Hayne. On his behalf, Daniel Webster wrote to Samuel Bell on October 7,[269] and to Joseph Gales, on November 23, 1847, to let each man know that Healy was interested in adding his portrait to his Webster Replying to Hayne.[270] Webster wrote that Healy would apply to Gales for a sitting when the artist arrived in Washington in “about a month hence.” In Washington, on January 30, 1848, Edith, the Healy’s fifth child, was born.[271] Shortly after this, in February, the couple learned that their royal patron, Louis-Philippe, had abdicated the throne.[272] The artist later wrote this “ended Healy’s fortune in France.” He also wrote that, although his English connections, too, were lost by that time, he had made “staunch” friends among his sitters in the United States.[273] In the spring, two portraits by Healy were exhibited at the Boston Athenaeum, one of which was a portrait of Louis Philippe.[274]

The Healys traveled back to Versailles in June of 1848,[275] but not long after, George returned alone to the United States. In November of 1848 he had a last sitting from Daniel Webster (bust, Museum of Fine Arts, Richmond, VA; full-length, Union League Club of Chicago), in Marshfield, Massachusetts.[276] Healy made plans to be in Providence at the end of December, to paint portraits of Mrs. Amory and Mrs. Duncan.[277]

By March of 1849 a “four foot long” finished study of Healy’s Webster Replying to Hayne was in existence.[278] In a letter written on April 18, 1849, Healy expressed his intentions to spend two years painting the work in Paris.[279] In June Healy returned to Paris, as per his plan.[280] While there, Healy began a correspondence with the sculptor, Hiram Powers (1805-1873). On November 11, 1849, Healy wrote Powers asking him for daguerreotypes of Powers’ busts of Calhoun, Judge Burnet and “any others who were in the Senate during the year 1830.”[281] On April 17, 1850, Healy wrote Powers, thanking him for sending five daguerreotypes. Powers’ images were of men ten to thirteen years younger than Healy’s, and thus more likely to show them as they appeared around 1839, the time of Healy’s historical portrait.[282]

Beginning on December 30, 1850, eight portraits by Healy were exhibited at the Paris Salon, including one of the deposed Louis Philippe, and one of John C. Calhoun.[283] Earlier, Healy had received a commission from the Common Council of Charleston to paint a full-length portrait of Calhoun.[284] A portrait of Calhoun by the artist was also exhibited at the Royal Academy, London, in the spring of 1851.[285]

Sadness was known in the Healy household at the end of 1850. Both sons died: first George, the youngest, of scarlet fever,[286] then Arthur. The eleven year old Arthur Faulkner died on November 4,[287] after a fall at school in Paris.[288] He was the eldest Healy child, and had shown promise as an artist. At some point the family appears to have moved back to Versailles, where another daughter, Maria, was born on July 1, 1851.[289]

Healy continued working on Webster Replying to Hayne, and planning for its exhibition in Boston in the fall of 1851. On February 16, Healy wrote Hiram Powers that he was “now painting the figures in the gallery.”[290] In a letter to Daniel Webster, dated April 29, from Paris, Healy discussed his plans for the painting. He wrote that his “great work will be finished in time to be publicly seen in Boston, about the first of September next.” He expressed hope that Faneuil Hall, where the picture was destined, could be lent to him for its exhibition, and asked Webster to present a letter with this request for the Hall to the City of Boston.[291]

The large, historical painting, Webster Replying to Hayne (16 x 30 feet), first conceived by Healy in 1844, was completed seven years later in Paris, in 1851. The scene depicts the constitutional debate in the Senate in 1830, when the orator, Senator Daniel Webster replied to Senator Robert Hayne with the words in favor of federation, “Liberty and union, one and inseparable, now and forever.”[292] The work includes 130 individual portraits,[293] in addition to a portrait of Louis Philippe, in an oval frame attached to the balcony.[294] The people represented in the painting include both those who did as well as others who did not actually attend the debate in 1830. Hiram Powers, for example, did not attend the debate, but is represented.[295]

Webster Replying to Hayne was exhibited in the United States for a little over a year. Its first showing was at the Boston Athenaeum, from September to October, 1851.[296] A brochure accompanied the exhibition.[297] Daniel Webster apparently viewed the painting with Healy at the Athenaeum in 1851.[298] The picture was reported to be the largest ever exhibited in this country. Mention was also made of Healy’s intention for the painting to be exhibited in “all the principal cities.”[299] After Boston, the painting traveled to the National Academy of Design, in New York,[300] and to the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts in Philadelphia.[301] In 1852, the city of Boston granted Healy’s petition to allow Webster Replying to Hayne to be exhibited at Faneuil Hall.[302] The painting was on display there from June through the end of the year. By year’s end, it had been purchased by subscription and the Boston Common Council for the City of Boston.[303]

[1]The author would like to thank the many individuals and members of organizations who have helped to make the research and writing of this biographical essay possible. Special thanks are due to the Illinois Historical Art Project for the invitation to participate in this project, and for use of its information resources, and to Professor William H. Gerdts, of The Graduate School and University Center, The City University of New York, sage advisor and guide, who also graciously permitted use of his personal library for research. Thanks to the Department of Art History at The Graduate School and University Center, C.U.N.Y for granting me a leave of absence from the doctoral program to work on this project and to the Administrative Department of the Frick Art Reference Library of The Frick Collection as well, for allowing a leave of absence for five weeks from my responsibilities in the Book Department of the Library. Thanks to members of the Bethards family, descendants of George P.A. Healy, for kindly welcoming my study of family paintings and archives.  Thanks to all the staff members of research centers who aided my research, including: Archives de la Ville de Paris, (Sandrine Aufran); Archives Nationales, Paris; Archives of American Art in New York, and Boston; Bibliotheque Nationale de France-Richelieu; Bibliotheque Nationale de France-Tolbiac, (Lanka Bokova); Art Institute of Chicago Library; Boston Public Library (Henry Scannell); Chicago Historical Society Library; Direction des Musées de France, Archives des Musées Nationaux, Paris, (Amelie Lefebure); Frick Art Reference Library, New York ; Harold Washington Public Library, Chicago; Hinsdale Public Library, Hinsdale, Illinois; Loyola University Library, Chicago; Massachusetts Historical Society, Boston (Carrie Foley, Nick Graham); Musée du Louvre, Département des Peintures, Centre de Documentation, Paris (Sylvie Dubois, Marie-Martine Dubreuil); New York Historical Society, New York (Megan Hahn, Justin McShea,); New York Public Library, Special Collections; and the Newberry Library, Chicago (Joellen Dickie, Victor Lieberman, Pat Morris, John Powell). Finally, thanks to Terry R., Gwendolyn Siska, Kerren Willner, my father, John Duzich, and late mother, Lily Rachel, in whose memory this essay is dedicated.

[2]The author of this essay visited Calvary Cemetery and the Healy gravesite in February of 1999.

[3]Consecrated in 1859, according to a plaque on a stone marker at the entrance to the Cemetery.

[4]George P.A. Healy, Reminiscences of a Portrait Painter, (Chicago: McClurg, 1894), p.16.

[5]Op. cit., Healy, Reminiscences…, 1894, p.14.

[6]Op. cit., Healy, Reminiscences…, 1894, p.14.

[7]Massachusetts Vital Records: Boston 1630-1849: Deaths & Burials, 1833-1836, microfiche, Boston Public Library, vol. 26, fiche no. 434. At her death in February 1836, Mary’s age was listed as thirty-eight.

[8]Op. cit., Healy, Reminiscences…, 1894, p.15-16.

[9] Marie de Mare, G.P.A. Healy, American Artist: an Intimate Chronicle of the Nineteenth Century,

(New York: David McKay Co., 1954), p.10. The church was probably the Cathedral of the Holy Cross, on Franklin Street, Boston, which, according to The Memorial History of Boston, edited by Justin Winsor, (Boston: Osgood, 1883), vol. 3, p.516-517, was dedicated in 1803, and was “for many years the only Catholic church in Boston.”

[10]Massachusetts Vital Records: a Register of Marriages in Boston, 1800 to 1849, microfiche, Boston Public Library, vol. A-J, p.381-382, fiche no. 190.

[11]Mary Bigot, Life of George P.A. Healy: Followed by a Selection of his Letters, (Edited in Loving Memory by his Son and Daughters, 1913), p.47.

[12]George P.A. Healy Diaries, 1879-1891, Frick Art Reference Library, New York, 05/06/1890. According to the Memorial History of Boston, edited by Justin Winsor, (Boston: Osgood, 1883), vol. 3, p.518-519, Boston was made an episcopal see by Pius VII in 1808, and Dr. John de Cheverus was appointed first Bishop of Boson in 1810. Bishop Cheverus returned to France in 1823, became Bishop of Montauban, and later died as Cardinal Archbishop of Bordeaux, on July 19, 1836.

[13]Elizabeth P. Reynolds, To Live Upon Canvas: the Portrait Art of Thomas Cantwell Healy, (Jackson: Mississippi Museum of Art, 1980), p.4, note 2.

[14]Op. cit., Reynolds, To Live Upon Canvas…, 1980, pp.2-4, 11; and, op. cit., de Mare, G.P.A. Healy, American Artist, 1954, p.10.

[15]Op. cit., Reynolds, 1980, p. 4, note 3, according to entry in the Healy family Holy Bible.

[16]The Boston Directory, 1826, p.145; 1827, p.134. In both years the family surname is given in an alternate spelling, “Healey, William, capt., Sea.”

[17]Op. cit., Healy, Reminiscences…, 1894, p.19-20.

[18]Op. cit., de Mare, G.P.A. Healy, American Artist, 1954, p.11.

[19]Op. cit., Healy, Reminiscences…, 1894, p.17.

[20]Op. cit., Healy, Reminiscences…, 1894, p.17.

[21]Op. cit., Healy, Reminiscences…, 1894, p.20.

[22]Op. cit., Healy, Reminiscences…, 1894, p.21.

[23]Op. cit., Healy, Reminiscences…, 1894, p.21.

[24]Op. cit., Healy, Reminiscences…, 1894, p.22.

[25]Op. cit., Healy, Reminiscences…, 1894, p.16. According to Healy’s daughter, Mary Bigot, op. cit., Life of George P.A. Healy:, 1913, p.3, the fact that William Healy sat for Gilbert Stuart for his portrait, showed that, “at one time he must have been in pretty good circumstances.”

[26]Op. cit., Healy, Reminiscences…, 1894, p.22.

[27]Op. cit., Healy, Reminiscences…, 1894, p.23.

[28]A Climate for Art: the History of the Boston Athenaeum Gallery, 1827-1873, (Boston: Boston Athenaeum, 1980), p.12. Sully began work on the portrait on July 7, 1831 and finished it on May 18, 1832, in time for it to be exhibited at the annual exhibition at the Boston Athenaeum in 1832. See: Edward Biddle and Mantle Fielding, The Life and Works of Thomas Sully (1783-1872), (Charleston, SC: Garnier & Co., 1969), p.246, cat. No. 1365, Thomas Handasyde Perkins (1764-1854).

[29]Op. cit., Healy, Reminiscences…, 1894, p.25. Healy remembered being “about eighteen.”

[30]Op. cit., Healy, Reminiscences…, 1894, p.25.

[31]Op. cit., Healy, Reminiscences…, 1894, p.27.

[32]Op. cit., Healy, Reminiscences…, 1894, p.29.

[33]Op. cit., A Climate for Art, 1980, p.12.

[34]Catalogue of the Sixth Exhibition of Paintings in the Athenaeum Gallery, (Boston: Press of John H. Eastburn, 1832), catalog nos. 9 (Lady), 23 (Portrait), 36 (Flagg) and no. 236 (Boy). Locations of these works are unknown.

[35]The portrait of Pond is signed and dated, “G.P.A. Healy/1832.”

[36]Op. cit., Catalogue of the Sixth Exhibition of Paintings in the Athenaeum Gallery, 1832, catalog no. 3. There has been some confusion as to the authorship of the Healy paintings listed in the Boston Athenaeum exhibition of 1832. In The Boston Athenaeum: Art Exhibition Index, 1827-1874, by Robert F. Perkins, Jr. and William J. Gavin III, (Boston: The Library of the Boston Athenaeum, 1980), pp.75-76, four paintings are attributed to Thomas Cantwell (nos. 3, 9, 23 and 36), and only one (no. 236) to George Healy. The reason for this listing is probably due to the fact that catalog no. 3 is listed as by “T.C. Healey, a lad 11 yrs. of age,” while nos. 9, 23 and 36, are listed only as by “Healey,” and no. 236 by “G. Heal.” In view of information found in the more contemporary source, the essay, “George P.A. Healy,” in, Biographical Sketches of the Leading Men of Chicago, (Chicago: Wilson & St. Clair, 1868), p.628, which indicates that the two Tucker family portraits were exhibited at the Boston Athenaeum in 1832, it seems more likely that only catalog entry no. 3 should be attributed to Thomas Cantwell, while catalogue nos. 9, 23, 36 and 236 should be attributed to George P.A. Healy. Thomas Cantwell exhibited at the Boston Athenaeum only one other time, in 1840. George exhibited at the Boston Athenaeum frequently between 1832 and 1872.

[37]Op. cit., Reynolds, To Live Upon Canvas…, 1980, p.4. John Reynolds Healy was recorded at his death in 1842, as a portrait painter.

[38]Op. cit., Healy, Reminiscences…, 1894, p.29.

[39]Op. cit., Healy, Reminiscences…, 1894, p.29.

[40]Op. cit., de Mare, G.P.A. Healy, American Artist, 1954, p.17.

[41]Op. cit., de Mare, G.P.A. Healy, American Artist, 1954, p.21.

[42]Op. cit., Healy, Reminiscences…, 1894, p.33. According to Marie de Mare, op. cit., de Mare, G.P.A. Healy, American Artist, 1954, p.28, Healy was five feet eight inches tall, and called “Little Healy,” in the United States, but not in Europe.

[43]Op. cit., Healy, Reminiscences…, 1894, p.33.

[44]Stimpson’s Boston Directory, 1833, p.185: “Healy, G.P.A. portrait painter, 13 School,” p.55, “School street.”

[45]Op. cit., de Mare, G.P.A. Healy, American Artist, 1954, p.22.

[46]Catalogue of the Seventh Exhibition of Paintings in the Athenaeum Gallery, (Boston: Press of John E. Eastburn, 1833), catalog no. 53.

[47]Op. cit., Healy, Reminiscences…, 1894, pp.33-34.

[48]“George P.A. Healy,” in, Biographical Sketches of the Leading Men of Chicago, (Chicago: Wilson & St. Clair, 1868), p.629.

[49]Op. cit., Healy, Reminiscences…, 1894, p.34. According to, A Souvenir of the Exhibition Entitled Healy’s Sitters, or a Portrait Panorama of the Victorian Age… (Richmond: Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, 1950), p.12. This source lists Healy’s ocean voyages.

[50]Op. cit., Healy Diaries, 11/02/1886.

[51]Op. cit., de Mare, G.P.A. Healy, American Artist, 1954, p.25.

[52]Massachusetts Vital Records: Boston 1630-1849, Deaths & Burials, 1833-1836, microfiche, Boston Public Library, vol. 26, fiche no. 431. Listed in this source as, “William Haley.”

[53]James L. Yarnall, and William H. Gerdts, The National Museum of American Art’s Index to American Art Exhibition Catalogues, from the Beginning through the 1876 Centennial Year, (Boston: G.K. Hall & Co., 1986), vol. 1, p.13; vol. 3, p.1670, no. 42261 (Lady).

[54]Catalogue of the Eighth Exhibition of Paintings in the Athenaeum Gallery, (Boston: Press of J.H. Eastburn, 1834), catalog nos. 116 (Boyden), 131 (Homer), 156 (Portrait), and 194 (Brown). Locations unknown.

[55]Encyclopedia Britannica, (Chicago: Encyclopaedia Britannica, Inc.; William Benton, 1971), vol. 13, p.593.

[56]Op. cit., de Mare, G.P.A. Healy, American Artist, 1954, p.26.

[57]Op. cit., de Mare, G.P.A. Healy, American Artist, 1954, p.30. Apart from Healy’s autobiography, published in 1894, and a short biography of him by his daughter, Mary Bigot, published in 1913, Marie de Mare’s lively biography of her grandfather—based on oral tradition and written documents, which are sometimes identified in the text—has been the most complete account of Healy’s life to date. Illness at the end of the author’s life may have precluded her from documenting the information in her book as fully as a reader might have wished.

[58]Op. cit., Healy, Reminiscences…, 1894, pp.77, 105. One chapter of Healy’s autobiography is titled, “Thomas Couture,” pp.77-106. The identical chapter was also published in, Modern French Masters: a Series of Biographical and Critical Reviews by American Artists, (New York: The Century Co., 1896). See also: “Memoirs of Three Painters: Reminiscences of a Portrait Painter, by George P.A. Healy…,” book review, in, The Nation, 11/29/1894, p. 411.

[59]William Dunlap, History of the Rise and Progress of the Arts of Design in the United States, newly edited by Alexander Wyckoff…, (New York: Benjamin Blom, Inc., 1965; first published in 1834), v. 3, p.301.

[60]Op. cit., Healy, Reminiscences…, 1894, pp.108-110.

[61]Op. cit., “George P. A. Healy,” in, Biographical Sketches…, 1868, p.629.

[62]Op. cit., Healy, Reminiscences…, 1894, p.111.

[63]Op. cit., “George P.A. Healy,” in, Biographical Sketches…, 1868, p.629.

[64]Op. cit., “George P.A. Healy, “ in, Biographical Sketches…, 1868, p.629.

[65]Op. cit., Healy, Reminiscences…, 1894, p.39.

[66]Op. cit., de Mare, G.P.A. Healy, American Artist, 1954, pp.30-31.

[67]Op. cit., “George P.A. Healy,” in, Biographical Sketches…, 1868, p.629.

[68]Catalogue of the Ninth Exhibition of Paintings in the Athenaeum Gallery, (Boston: Press of J.H. Eastburn, 1835), catalog nos. 23 (Marriage), 27 (“Saviour”) and 34 (Prince). According to the catalog entry, no. 34 was a copy of a painting in the Louvre. Locations unknown.

[69]Typsecript of letter, from Healy to Dr. Bass, 06/26/1841, Paris, in the Healy Papers, Hay Collection, Special Collections, New York Public Library. Nos. 5 (Study from Veronese, Louvre, $75), 6 (Entombment from Titian, Louvre, $75) and 14 (Copy from Velazquez, London, $50) , are all dated 1835. The date and location given for Healy’s copy of the Velazquez painting in this letter is “London 1835,” which would suggest Healy was in London as early as 1835. But “London” may not be not correct. According to another source, op. cit., Yarnell and Gerdts, 1985, vol.. 3, p.1670, no. 42181, Healy made a copy of Velazquez’ Infanta of Spain from a work at the Louvre, Paris. Thomas Robson Hay, historian, served as research assistant to Marie de Mare during preparation of her book, George P.A. Healy: American Artist (1954). Hay deposited his papers related to de Mare’s book in the New York Public Library. A copy of the papers is available on microfilm in the Archives of American Art. The author of this essay consulted the Healy Papers in the Hay Collection at both the New York Public Library and in the Archives of American Art.

[70]Stimpson’s Boston Directory, 1835, p.204. His mother was listed, as “Healey, Mary, widow, 35 Sweetster Court.”

[71]Op. cit., de Mare, G.P.A. Healy, American Artist, 1954, p.34.

[72]The painting is illustrated in, Life in Philadelphia, (Philadelphia: Philadelphia Museum of Art, 1940), p.15, no. 33.

[73]Op. cit., de Mare, G.P.A. Healy, American Artist, 1954, p.34. Marie de Mare refers to correspondence, now unlocated, between mother and son.

[74]Massachussets Vital Records, Deaths & Burials, Boston, 1630-1849, microfiche, Boston Public Library, vol. 26, fiche no. 434. “Wilcutt” was her undertaker.

[75]Explication des ouvrages de peinture…exposés au Musée Royal, le 1er, mars 1836, (Paris: Vinchon …Ballard, 1836), catalog nos. 943 (M.B.), and 944 (M.D.). The catalog gives his address in Paris as 23, place Vendôme. Healy exhibited at the Paris Salons in different years, until 1890. According to Lois Fink, in American Art at the Nineteenth-Century Paris Salons, (Washington, D.C.: National Museum of American Art, Smithsonian Institution; New York: Cambridge University Press, 1990), p.50, Healy was the longest exhibiting American artist at the Paris Salons of the nineteenth century.

[76]Catalogue of the Tenth Exhibition of Paintings in the Athenaeum Gallery, 1836. (Boston, 1836), catalog nos. 119 (Grosvenor), 129 (Otis) and 139 (Titian’s Daughter). The Prince of Orange Going Out in the Morning, from Cuyp, was again exhibited in 1836, according to, op. cit., Perkins & Gavin III, The Boston Athenaeum: Art Exhibition Index, 1827-1874, 1980, p. 76. All unlocated.

[77]Op. cit., Letter, Healy to Bass, 06/26/1841. No. 4, “a copy from the well known Titian, Louvre, 1836,”

($200), and no. 12, “A study from the daughter of my landlady, Paris, 1836,” ($50).

[78]Op. cit., Healy, Reminiscences…, 1894, p.40.

[79]Op. cit., Bigot, Life of George P.A. Healy:, 1913, p.14; and, op. cit., de Mare, G.P.A. Healy, American Artist, 1954, p.35. The letter is unlocated. Marie de Mare mentions another letter (p.39), also unlocated, from Healy to his sister, Agnes, in which he describes his arrival in Dover, and the Faulkners’ warm reception. In this letter he asks if Francis Alexander, who was painting a portrait of his sister, Agnes, would send Healy a sketch of it. De Mare refers to yet other, unlocated letters (p. 41), in which Agnes writes to George that she wants to become a nun, he protests her wish, and she writes back to say that she has not been accepted by the “Grey Nuns of Quebec.”

[80]Op. cit., “George P.A. Healy,” in, Biographical Sketches…, 1868, p.629. An obituary for Healy, in the Chicago Herald, 06/25/1894, also indicates that Healy “was at the last exhibition given in Somerset House when he went to London for the first time in 1836.”

[81]Op. cit., de Mare, G.P.A. Healy, American Artist, 1954, p.42. The work is unlocated.

[82]Op. cit., “George P.A. Healy,” in, Biographical Sketches…, 1868, p.630.

[83]Letter, from Healy to Francis Alexander, Boston, 02/08/1838, from 28 Grafton Street, London, Drake Collection, Historical Society of Pennsylvania, case 8, box 1, typescript copy of letter consulted in the collection of the Archives of American Art, microfilm roll D130, frame 006. Op. cit., Letter, Healy to Alexander, 02/08/1838. In this letter, Healy tells Alexander about his “great success in England,” and says that he has “been but a year in London.”

[84]Op. cit., de Mare, G.P.A. Healy, American Artist, 1954, p.48; and, op. cit., Letter, Healy to Alexander, 02/08/1838.

[85]Op. cit., Letter, Healy to Alexander, 02/08/1838.

[86]Op. cit., Healy, Reminiscences…, 1894, p.42.

[87]Op. cit., Letter, Healy to Alexander, 02/08/1838.

[88]Op. cit., de Mare, G.P.A. Healy, American Artist, 1954, p.52.

[89]Op. cit., de Mare, G.P.A. Healy, American Artist, 1954, pp.53-54.

[90]Op. cit., de Mare, G.P.A. Healy, American Artist, 1954, p.54.

[91]Op. cit., Healy, Reminiscences…, 1894, p.42.

[92]Op. cit., de Mare, G.P.A. Healy, American Artist, 1954, p54.

[93]Op. cit., Healy, Reminiscences…, 1894, p.43.

[94]Op. cit., de Mare, G.P.A. Healy, American Artist, 1954, p.56.

[95]Louis Marie Fink, American Art at the Nineteenth-Century Paris Salons, (Washington, D.C.: National Museum of American Art, Smithsonian Institution; New York: Cambridge University Press, 1990), p.354. The catalog lists his address as, “34, r. des Petits-Augustins.

[96]Catalogue of the Eleventh Exhibition of Paintings in the Athenaeum Gallery, (Boston: John H. Eastburn, 1837), catalog nos. 81 and 89. Paintings unlocated.

[97]Exhibition of Portraits by George P.A. Healy, January 5 to January 31, 1930,” (Louisville: J.B. Speed Memorial Museum, 1930), catalog no. 3. According to the catalog entry for this work, it was “painted for a competition in four hours, when Mr. Healy was a student at the Atelier of Baron Gros.” The painting however, is signed, “Geo. P.A. Healy 1837,” and so was probably not painted under Baron Gros who died in 1835; see also the catalog entry for the painting in, Vaughn L. Glasgow and Pamela A. Johnson, G.P.A. Healy: Famous Figures and Louisiana Patrons, (New Orleans: The Louisiana State Museum, 12/1976-5/1977), pp.12-13.

[98]The portrait of Rensselaer is signed and dated, “Geo. P.A. Healy/August 1837.”

[99]Op. cit., de Mare, G.P.A. Healy, American Artist, 1954, pp.58-59. De Mare’s research assistant, historian Thomas Robson Hay, wrote, in a letter to David McKibbin, of The Boston Athenaeum, on 05/16/1953 (letter, Healy Papers, Hay Collection, Special Collections, New York Public Library), that “apparently the portrait of Audubon was begun late in 1837 and completed early next year.”

[100]Op. cit., Healy, Reminiscences…, 1894, p.204.

[101]Op. cit., Healy, Reminiscences…, 1894, p.205.

[102]Op. cit., de Mare, G.P.A. Healy, American Artist, 1954, pp.58, 62.

[103]Op. cit., Healy, Reminiscences…, 1894, p.25-26.

[104]Op. cit., Letter, Healy to Alexander, 02/08/1838.

[105]Op. cit., Letter, Healy to Alexander, 02/08/1838. The references to “Wilkie” and “Leslie” are to the English artists, David Wilkie (1785-1841) and Charles Robert Leslie (1794-1859).

[106]Op. cit., Letter, Healy to Alexander, 02/08/1838.

[107]Algernon Graves, The Royal Academy of Arts: a Complete Dictionary of Contributors and their Work from its Foundation in 1769 to 1904, (London: Henry Graves and Co. Ltd. And George Bell and Sons, 1906), vol. 4, p. 54, catalog nos. 246 (Stevenson), 336 (M’Leod), 395 (Hume), 416 (Audubon), 459 (Power children), and 648 (Lucet). Healy first exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1838, and continued exhibiting there in various years through 1883.

[108]Explication des ouvrages de peinture…exposés au Musée Royal, le 1er mars 1838, (Paris: Vinchon, Rils…Ballard, 1838), cat. no. 905 (Portrait de M.B.L.). This was the only year Thomas Cantwell Healy exhibited at the Salon. Thomas Cantwell’s address is given, in the catalog as, 5, r. Neuve-Richelieu.

[109]Op. cit., de Mare, G.P.A. Healy, American Artist, 1954, p.72 (Thomas Cantwell arrives in Paris at age 18), pp.80-81; op. cit., Reynolds, To Live Upon Canvas…, 1980, p.1, chronology (Thomas Cantwell arrives in 1838, returns to the U.S. in 1839).

[110]Op. cit., de Mare, G.P.A. Healy, American Artist, 1954, p.67.

[111]Healy received Stevenson’s commission to paint Soult in the summer of 1838, according to “George P.A. Healy,” in, Biographical Sketches…, 1868, p.630.

[112]Op. cit., de Mare, G.P.A. Healy, American Artist, 1954, pp.67-68. Healy, in his Reminiscences…, 1894, p.167, also refers to ‘assisting’ at the Queen’s coronation ceremony, but mistakenly gives its date as April 25, rather than June 28, 1838.

[113]Op. cit., Healy Diaries, 09/28/1885, and 05/30/1887. In 1887, Healy reminisced to his son-in-law, Charles Bigot, about his trip to Antwerp after the Queen’s coronation.

[114]Op. cit., Healy, Reminiscences…, 1894, p.170.

[115]Op. cit., “George P.A. Healy,” in, Biographical Sketches…, 1868, p.630.

[116]A portrait of Gen. Cass is illustrated in, op. cit., Fink, American Art…, 1990, p. 45.

[117]Op. cit., de Mare, G.P.A. Healy, American Artist, 1954, p.70.

[118]Op. cit., Healy, Reminiscences…, 1894, p.116.

[119]Op. cit., de Mare, G.P.A. Healy, American Artist, 1954, p.71; Op. cit., Healy, Reminiscences…, 1894, p.170.

[120]Explication des ouvrages de peinture… exposés au Musée Royal le 1er mars, 1839, (Paris: Vinchon …Ballard, 1839), catalog no. 1002 (Gen. Cass). Healy’s address is given in this catalog as, 34, r.des Petits-Augustins.”

[121]Op. cit., Healy, Reminiscences…, 1894, pp.116-117.

[122]Op. cit., Healy, Reminiscences…, 1894, p.117.

[123]Op. cit., Healy, Reminiscences…, 1894, p.119, note 1. A portrait of Louis Philippe by Healy is illustrated in, Souvenir of the Exhibition Entitled, Healy’s Sitters, or, a Portrait Panorama of the Victorian Age…, (hereafter referred to as, Healy’s Sitters), (Richmond: Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, 1/24/1950-3/5/1950), p.30.

[124]Op. cit., de Mare, G.P.A. Healy, American Artist, 1954, p.73. Marie de Mare refers to a letter, now unlocated, from Cass to Healy.

[125]Op. cit., Healy, Reminiscences…, 1894, p.117.

[126]Op. cit., Healy, Reminiscences…, 1894, pp.117-118.

[127]Op. cit., de Mare, G.P.A. Healy, American Artist, p.73. A slightly different sequence of events regarding Healy’s first portrait of Louis Philippe is given in, op. cit., “George P.A. Healy,” in, Biographical Sketches…, 1868, p.631. According to this account, Healy began the portrait of Louis Philippe, went to England to marry Louisa, then returned to Paris to continue painting the King.

[128]Op. cit., de Mare, G.P.A. Healy, American Artist, 1954, p.73. Louisa later became Catholic.

[129]Marriage certificate, George Peter Alexander Healy and Louisa Phipps, 07/23/1839, Healy Papers, Hay Collection, Special Collections, New York Public Library; op. cit., Healy, Reminiscences…, 1894, p.46 and op. cit., de Mare, G.P.A. Healy, American Artist, 1954, p.156.

[130]Op. cit., Healy, Reminiscences…, 1894, p.48.

[131]Op. cit., de Mare, G.P.A. Healy, American Artist, 1954, p.74. George and Louisa Healy had nine children: Arthur Faulkner (1840-1850), Agnes (1842-1915), Mary (1843-1936), George (1846-1850), Edith (1848-1935), Maria (1851-19--), Emily (1853-1909), George Louis (1855-1940) and Kathleen (1858-19--). Seven children survived childhood. Birth and death dates are from, “Biographical notes about members of the Healy family,” Archives of American Art, microfilm roll D130, frame 513.

[132]Op. cit., Healy, Reminiscences…, 1894, p.50.

[133]Op. cit., Mary Bigot, Life of George P.A. Healy, 1913, p.19.

[134]Francis Fry Wayland, Andrew Stevenson, (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1949), p.239, note. 4.

[135]For illustration of the portrait of Mrs. Adams, see, Photoarchives, Frick Art Reference Library, New York. The portrait is signed, “G.P.A. Healy 1839.” The work is unlocated.

[136]Op. cit., “George P.A. Healy,” in, Biographical Sketches…, 1868, p.631.

[137]For illustration of Mrs. Cass’ portrait, see, op. cit., Fink, , American Art…, 1990, p. 45.

[138]Typescript copy of letter, from Delort, the King’s Aide-de-Camp, to General Cass, 11/14/1839, Archives of American Art, microfilm roll D130, frame 009. The letter, in French, translated into English above, reads as follows: “La Reine a vu le portrait de Madame Cass. Sa Majesté a daigné me confier l’agréable mission de vous dire qu’elle avait été satisfaite de ce bel ouvrage, qui fait honneur au jeune artiste Mr. Healy, qui en est l’auteur .…P.S. Veuillez bien prendre la peine de faire prévenir Mr. Healy de faire retirer le portrait de Mme. Cass.”

[139]Op. cit., de Mare, G.P.A. Healy, American Artist, 1954, p.81.

[140]Op. cit., de Mare, G.P.A. Healy, American Artist, 1954, pp.81-83; and op. cit., Healy, Reminiscences…, 1894, p.187.

[141]See, op. cit., Healy’s Sitters, 1950, pp.72-73, and, op. cit., Fink, American Art…, 1990, p.51.

[142]Op. cit., Graves, The Royal Academy of Arts:, 1906, vol. 4, p. 54, catalog no. 295 (Bates), 239 (Soult), 506 (Study of a head). Healy’s address is given as “2, Polygon, Clarendon Square.” The Bates portrait is unlocated.

[143]Explication des ouvrages de peinture…exposés au Musée Royal le 5 mars 1840, (Paris: Vinchon … Ballard, 1840), catalog no. 816 (Mrs. Cass). This was the only portrait exhibited by Healy at the Salon of 1840. Healy’s address is given as, “14, rue de l”université, chez M. Edan.”

[144]Op. cit., Fink, American Art…, 1990, p. 46; and op. cit., Healy, Reminiscences…, 1894, p.52.

[145]Typescript of letter, from S.C. Stevenson to My dear Duchess (The Duchess of Inverness, wife of the Duke of Sussex, Kensington Palace, London,) 06/25/1840, Healy Papers, Hay Collection, Special Collections, New York Public Library. “He Healy has taken a fine likeness of the King of France and received from him the gold medal of this year.”

[146]Op. cit., Healy, Reminiscences…, 1894, p.52.

[147]Op. cit., de Mare, G.P.A. Healy, American Artist, 1954, pp.83-87. It is not quite clear exactly when Healy went to Windsor Castle to copy portraits for the King. According to Marie de Mare, Louis Philippe sent Healy with his wife and infant son to Windsor Castle for two months while the Queen was not in residence, in 1840, to copy portraits for his “Versailles gallery,” (p. 83), which were “crated and on their way” after Healy’s stay at Windsor Castle. This date, 1840, however, is difficult to reconcile with the fact that Healy’s English portraits are not recorded as entering the Versailles collection until beginning in August of 1844. According to op. cit., Healy, Reminiscences…, 1894, p.124, it was in 1841 that he was painting English portraits at Windsor Castle. But Healy writes prior to this, that it was after he had painted his copy of Washington for Louis Philippe—it was in 1842 that the Washington was painted, and February of 1843 when the copy entered Versailles— that the King had given him orders for “various other copies” (p.122). Elsewhere, in Healy’s diary, July 18, 1885, he recalls he worked at Windsor in 1843 for the King for his gallery at Versailles. In his diary, June 19, 1886, he recalls painting pictures at Buckingham Palace for Louis Philippe in 1843. Perhaps Healy began copying portraits at Windsor Castle in 1840 or 1841, and later received an official commission in 1843.

[148]Op. cit., de Mare, G.P.A. Healy, American Artist, 1954, p.38.

[149]Op. cit., Healy, Reminiscences…, 1894, p.111.

[150] Op. cit., Letter, from S.C. Stevenson to My dear Duchess, 06/25/1840. The letter writer, Mrs. Stevenson, made a copy of the letter for Healy. This copy of the letter was in the possession of Marie de Mare in 1953.

[151]Op. cit., de Mare, G.P.A. Healy, American Artist, 1954, p.86.

[152]Op. cit., Healy, Reminiscences…, 1894, p.111.

[153]Op. cit., de Mare, G. P. A. Healy, American Artist, 1954, Pp.86-87; and op. cit., Healy, Reminiscences, 1894, pp.113-114. Healy wrote that the holiday spent at Strawberry Hill, was “one of my pleasantest remembrances of those days.”

[154]Exhibition of Portraits by George P.A. Healy, January 5 to 31, 1930, (Louisville: J.B. Speed Memorial Museum, 1930), catalog no. 4, “Small study of General Fox - (sitting at the window of the library in Holland House, London, England).”

[155]Op. cit., de Mare, G. P. A. Healy, American Artist, 1954, pp.63-65.

[156]Op. cit., Healy, Reminiscences…, 1894, pp.112, 115. Sir Lewis Grant. Works unlocated.

[157]Op. cit., Healy, Reminiscences…, 1894, pp.217-218.

[158]Russell M. Jones, “American Painters in Paris: the Rate of Exchange, 1825-1848,” in Apollo, v. 135, no. 359, n.s., 01/1992, p.75. According to this source, Healy bought the first work that William Morris Hunt exhibited. See also, op. cit., de Mare, G. P. A. Healy, American Artist, 1954, p.205. Healy helped other artists, including his friend, Edme Savinien Dubourjal.

[159]Op. cit., Fink, American Art…, 1990, pp.35-36, and p.295, note 7. Fink indicates that, according to Kensett’s Journal, 03/22/1841, “Rossiter is painting his artistic group of Kensett, Durand, Casilear, Edmonds, Freeman, Healy, Schaft (sic), and himself…,” and two other artists.

[160]An illustration of the portrait, dated 1841, is found in, op. cit., Glasgow and Johnson, G.P.A. Healy: Famous Figures and Louisiana Patrons, 1976, p.55.

[161] Letter, Geo. P.A. Healy to Mrs. Atkinson, 06/07/1841, Paris, Healy Papers, Hay Collection, Special Collections, New York Public Library.

[162]Op. cit. Healy, Reminiscences, 1894, p.175.

[163]Op. cit., de Mare, G. P. A. Healy, American Artist, 1954, p.88.

[164]Op. cit., Fink, American Art…, 1990, p.355. He later exhibited the study at the Paris Salon in 1889.

[165]Jared Sparks, Washington: fondation de la république des Etats-Unis d’Amérique: vie de Washington: histoire de la guerre de l’indépendance et de la fondation de la république des Etats-Unis d’Amerique…précedée d’une introduction sur le caractère de Washington et son influence dans la révolution des Etats-Unis d’Amérique, par M. Guizot, (Paris: Didier, 1851). The first edition of the French edition was published in 1840. In his preface to the new edition of 1851, Guizot wrote, “C’est sous la monarchie, et presque au sein des conseils du roi Louis-Philippe, que j’ai rendu cet hommage à Washington, à la fondation d’une grande République par un grand homme…”

[166]Op. cit., Fink, American Art…, 1990, p.47. Lois Fink points out that in the portrait, Guizot stands near “papers relating to his writings on George Washington.”

[167]Op. cit., Fink, American Art…, 1990, p.296, note 31.

[168]Op. cit., de Mare, G. P. A. Healy, American Artist, 1954, p.107.

[169]Op. cit., Encyclopedia Britannica, 1971, vol. 14, p.360.

[170]Op. cit., Glasgow and Johnson, G.P.A. Healy: Famous Figures and Louisiana Patrons, 1976, p.27.

[171]Op. cit., de Mare, G. P. A. Healy, American Artist, 1954, pp.77-78.

[172]Claire Constans, Musée National du Château de Versailles: les Peintures, (Paris: Réunion des Musées Nationaux, 1995), vol. 1, p.7. The above quotation is a translation of the French text, “A toutes les gloires de la France.”

[173]Op. cit., Constans, Musée National du Château de Versailles, 1995, vol. 1, p.8.

[174]Draft letter, 02/29/1842, Musée du Louvre, Archives. The letter reads in part, “…ayant besoin de s’entendre avec Mr. Healy sur le portrait de Washington, le prie de vouloir bien prendre le peine de passer au musée, lorsqu’il aura occasion de venir de ce coté…” (in English, “…wish to speak with Mr. Healy about the portrait of Washington, please ask him to come to the museum the next time he is in the vicinity…”). The letter includes an additional note, as follows, “Vue Healy 1 Feb. 1842” (saw Healy on Feb. 1, 1842).

[175]Op. cit., Healy, Reminiscences…, 1894, pp.119-120.

[176]Op. cit., “George P.A. Healy,” in, Biographical Sketches…, 1868, p.631.

[177]Op. cit., “George P.A. Healy,” in, Biographical Sketches…, 1868, p.631.

[178]Op. cit., de Mare, G. P. A. Healy, American Artist, 1954, p.95.

[179]Op. cit., “George P.A. Healy,” in, Biographical Sketches…, 1868, pp.631-632.

[180]Op. cit., de Mare, G. P. A. Healy, American Artist, 1954, p.93.

[181]Op. cit., de Mare, G. P. A. Healy, American Artist, 1954, p.95.

[182]Draft letter, Edward Everett, London, to Lewis Cass, 04/12/1842, Massachusetts Historical Society, Boston, “I have received by Mr. Healy your …of the 4th & 6th. I shall take great pleasure in introducing Mr. Healy to my friends at home. His merit as an artist is already well known in Boston. I rejoice in the honorable commission which the King has given him. It reflects great credit on both and I suspect also that you ought to come in for no small share of the honor of bringing it about.”

[183]Draft letter, Edward Everett, London, to his sister, Mrs. Hale, 04/16/1842, Massachusetts Historical Society, Boston. The letter was to be delivered by Healy to Mrs. Hale, “I send my dispatches by Mr. Healy…”

[184]Op. cit., de Mare, G. P. A. Healy, American Artist, 1954, p.93.

[185]Op. cit., Reynolds, To Live Upon Canvas…, 1980, p.6. Reynolds indicates that John Healy’s death, of typhus, is recorded in the Vital Records of Lowell, Massachusetts, to the end of the year 1849, as on September 29, 1842. Yet Reynolds allows for a possible earlier death date, sometime before George Healy’s arrival in the U.S.

[186]Op. cit., de Mare, G. P. A. Healy, American Artist, 1954, p.97-98.

[187]Op. cit., Letter, Healy to Bass, 06/26/1841. Catalogue of the Sixteenth Exhibition of Paintings and of the Fourth Exhibition of Sculpture in the Athenaeum Gallery, (Boston: Eastburn’s Press, 1842), p. 3, catalog nos. 80 (the Sisters), 82 (Study from Titian), 86 (Portrait), 92 (Audubon).

[188]Op. cit., de Mare, G. P. A. Healy, American Artist, 1954, pp.98-99.

[189] Op. cit., “George P.A. Healy,” in, Biographical Sketches…, 1868, p. 632.

[190] National Academy of Design Exhibition Record, 1826-1860, (New York: Printed for the New-York Historical Society, 1943), vol. I, pp. x-xi, 220. Healy first exhibited at the Academy in 1842. He exhibited there in various years through 1887. See also, The National Academy of Design Exhibition Record, 1861-1900, compiled and edited by Maria Naylor, (New York: Published by Kennedy Galleries, 1973).

[191]Op. cit., de Mare, G. P. A. Healy, American Artist, 1954, p.102.

[192]Letter, J. J. Ab—t… to Healy, from Washington, 05/30/1842, Papers, 1839-1966, of George Peter Alexander Healy family, Archives of American Art, microfilm roll 1209, frame 1166.

[193]Letter, Healy to My very dear friend …, 06/07/1842, from Washington, Newberry Library, Chicago.

[194]Op. cit., Letter, Healy to My very dear friend, 06/07/1842. See also, J. Q. Adams, J. Q., Memoirs of John Quincy Adams: Comprising Portions of his Diary from 1795 to 1848, edited by Charles Francis Adams, (Philadelphia: Lippincott, 1874-1877), vol. 11, p.175, entry, 6/12/1842.

[195]Op. cit., de Mare, G. P. A. Healy, American Artist, 1954, p.107, Washington Daily National Intelligencer, 06/15/1842. The author of the article, signed, “a fellow artist,” is identified as Charles King in de Mare’s book, where a quotation of it also appears.

[196]Op. cit., Healy’s Sitters, 1950, p.83.

[197]James Barber, and Frederick Voss, The Godlike Black Dan: a Selection of Portraits from Life in Commemoration of the Two Hundredth Anniversary of the Birth of Daniel Webster, (City of Washington: Published for the National Portrait Gallery by the Smithsonian Institution Press, 1982), p. 40. According to this source, Webster sat for Healy “four different” times “over a six-year period.”

[198]Letter, from Healy to My dear King, 10/07/1843, from 12 rue de la Pais, Paris, Historical Society of Pennsylvania, Archives of American Art, microfilm roll P20, frame 485, “I found the original portrait of Washington on my return to London and was enabled to retouch my copy which is now in a good light at Versailles.” See also, op. cit., “George P.A. Healy,” in, Biographical Sketches…, 1868, p.632; op. cit., Healy, Reminiscences…, 1894, p.122; and, op. cit., de Mare, G. P. A. Healy, American Artist, 1954, p.111.

[199]Draft letter, Edward Everett, 46 Grosvenor Place, London, to Healy, 11/02/1842, Massachusetts Historical Society, Boston, “My dear Sir, After you left me yesterday…”

[200]The portrait is signed, “G.P.A. Healy Paris 1842.” Healy had painted her brother, William Van Rensselaer, in 1837.

[201]Gilbert Stuart painted more than one portrait of George Washington. Healy copied Stuart’s “Lansdowne portrait,” made for Lord Lansdowne in 1796.

[202]“Commandes et Acquisitions,” Musées royaux, Peintres et Sculpteurs, Règne de Louis-Philippe, Comptes des Artistes, I, A-K (2DD21), Musée du Louvre, Archives. For it Healy received 2,500 francs.

[203]Op. cit., Reynolds, To Live Upon Canvas…, 1980, p.7, note 26, New Orleans Daily Picayune, 02/21/1843, p.2., col. 6.

[204]Op. cit., Healy, Reminiscences…, 1894, p.208.

[205]See, The Memorial History of Boston, edited by Justin Winsor, (Boston: Osgood, 1883), vol. 4, p.136, for an engraving of Wales, after Healy, 1843.

[206]Op. cit., Perkins & Gavin, The Boston Athenaeum: Art Exhibition Index, 1827-1874, 1980, p. 76. The portraits exhibited in 1843 at the Boston Athenaeum were: cat. no. 87 (Audubon), no. 91 (Copy from Titian), no. 96 (Portrait of a Lady and a Gentleman; owned by T.B. Wales), no. 100 (Portrait of a Gentleman).

[207]Op. cit., Graves, The Royal Academy of Arts:, 1906, vol. 4, p. 54, 1843, catalog no. 140 (Happy Moments). Healy’s address is listed as, “18, Grandby Street.”

[208]Op. cit., Healy Diaries, 07/18/1885, and 06/19/1886.

[209]Op. cit., Letter, Healy to King, 10/07/1843. In this letter Healy also writes that portraits he painted of Lord Washburn for Webster, and of Mr. Jackson have arrived in Boston.

[210]C. E. Curinier, Dictionnaire national des contemporains, (Paris: Office General d’Edition, 1899-1905), consulted on microfiche, Archives biographique français, ed. Sue Bradly, related to the French Biographical Index, (Munich: Saur, 1998), microfiche no. 209, frame 173.

[211]Op. cit., de Mare, G. P. A. Healy, American Artist, 1954, p.114.

[212]Op. cit., Yarnall and Gerdts, The National Museum of American Art’s Index…, 1986, vol. 1, p.13; vol. 3, pp.1670, 1674. The three portraits exhibited were, no. 42193 (Ashburton; owned by Webster), 42303 (gentleman; owned by Paige), 42304 (gentleman; owned by Paige).

[213]Op. cit., Perkins & Gavin, The Boston Athenaeum: Art Exhibition Index, 1827-1874, 1980, p.76. The four works exhibited at two different exhibitions at the Athenaeum in 1844 were: catalog no. 116 (Ecce Homo, copy), no. 128 (Audubon), no. 129 (After Titian), and, at the second exhibition in 1844, catalog no. 329 (Marshal Soult).

[214]Op. cit., National Academy of Design Exhibition Record, 1826-1860, 1943, vol. I, p.220, 1844, catalog no. 37 (Portrait of a Gentleman). Healy is listed as, “Honorary Member, Professional,” from 1844 to 1860. See p.xiv, which explains that, “Honorary Professional” was a membership class for professional artists who did not live in New York.

[215]Op. cit., Fink, American Art…, 1990, p.354.

[216]Op. cit., Graves, The Royal Academy of Arts:, 1906, vol. 4, p. 54.

[217]Op. cit., Constans, Musée National du Château de Versailles, 1995, vol. 1, p.459, catalog no. 2598. It is signed “Geo. P.A. Healy pinx. after Sir Martin A. Schee/Windsor Castle July 1844.”

[218]See, Livre d’Entrée, Musées Royaux, Règne de Louis-Philippe, peintures, dessins & chalcographie, for record of dates that portraits entered Versailles, and, Inv. Ecole Française, 8536-9971, anonymes supplément, 9972-1019, for amounts paid Healy for portraits. Both the Livre d’Entrée and the Inv. Ecole Française were consulted in the Service de Documentation, Departement des peintres, Musée du Louvre, Paris. See, op. cit., Constans, Musée National du Château de Versailles, 1995, vol. 1, p. 453-459. Forty-two portraits by Healy are in the collection of the Musée national du Château de Versailles, France. The twelve portraits that entered the collection in August of 1844 were of: Elisabeth Ière, queen of England (1533-1603)(400 francs); George IV, roi d’Angleterre (1762-1830), 1st son of George III (800 francs); Charles James Fox (400 francs); William Pitt (400 francs); Horatio, vicomte Nelson (200 francs); John Jervis (200 francs); Frederic, duc d’York, 2nd son of Geo III (400 francs); Guillaume IV (1765-1837), roi d’Angleterre, 3rd son of George III (800 francs); Henry Richard Vassal Fox (200 francs); Sir Robert Peel (200 francs); George Hamilton Gordon, comte d’Aberdeen (200 francs); Thomas Granville Leveson-Gower (200 francs) (all twelve, Musée national du Château de Versailles, France). (Healy received 4,400 francs for the twelve portraits: 800 francs for the full-length portraits, 400 for the half lengths, and 200 for the portraits less than one half length in size.)

[219]Op. cit., “George P.A. Healy,” in Biographical Sketches…, 1868, p.632.

[220]Op. cit., Livre d’Entrée (Inv. L-P), for record of dates portraits entered Versailles, and, Inv. Ecole Française, 8536-9971, anonymes supplément, 9972-1019, for amounts paid Healy for the portraits. See, op. cit., Constans, Musée National du Château de Versailles, 1995, vol. 1, pp.453-469. The portraits—chiefly of George III, his wife and children—were of: George III (1738-1820), roi d’Angleterre (800 francs); Sophie Charlotte (1744-1818)…reine d’Angleterre (800 francs); Sir Joshua Reynolds, the painter (200 francs); John Flaxman (200 francs); Robert Banks Jenkinson (200 francs); Robert Stewart (200 francs); Ernst Auguste 1er, 5th son of George III (200 francs); Sophie Augusta de Hanovre, 2nd daughter of George III (200 francs); Elisabeth de Hanovre, 3rd daughter of George III (200 francs); Marie de Hanovre, 4th daughter of George III (400 francs); Sophie de Hanovre, princess d’Angleterre, 5th daughter of George III (400 francs) (all eleven, Musée national du Château de Versailles, France). (Healy received 3,800 francs for the eleven additional English portraits.)

[221]Op. cit., de Mare, G. P. A. Healy, American Artist, 1954, p.118.

[222]Explication des ouvrages de peinture…exposés au Musée Royal le 15 mars, 1845, (Paris: Vinchon, 1845), no. 819 (Roi), 820 (Portrait de S. Ex. Le ministre plenipotentiaire des Etats-Unis d’Amerique), 821 (Portrait de jeune R.C…). Healy’s address is given as, “A Boston et, a Paris, chez M. Edan, 10, r. d’Angivilliers.”

[223]Op. cit., Healy, Reminiscences…, 1894, p.138.

[224]Op. cit., Healy, Reminiscences…, 1894, pp.143-144.

[225]Op. cit., de Mare, G. P. A. Healy, American Artist, 1954, p.128. The quotation is from the “diary of William Tyack, Niles Register, June 21, 1845, ” according to de Mare.

[226]Op. cit., Healy, Reminiscences…, 1894, pp.144-146; op. cit., de Mare, G. P. A. Healy, American Artist, 1954, p.128.

[227]Op. cit., Healy, Reminiscences…, 1894, p.147.

[228]Op. cit., Healy’s Sitters, 1950, p.34; op. cit., Constans, Musée National du Château de Versailles, 1995, vol. 1, p.457.

[229]Op. cit., de Mare, G. P. A. Healy, American Artist, 1954, pp.133-134.

[230]Arthur F. Jones and Bruce Weber, The Kentucky Painter: from the Frontier Era to the Great War, (Lexington: University of Kentucky Art Museum, 1981), p.27.

[231]Op. cit., de Mare, G. P. A. Healy, American Artist, 1954, p.139.

[232]Op. cit., Glasgow and Johnson, G.P.A. Healy: Famous Figures and Louisiana Patrons, 1976, p.27.

[233]Op. cit., de Mare, G. P. A. Healy, American Artist, 1954, p.144.

[234]Op. cit., Bigot, Life of George P.A. Healy, 1913, pp.52, 58-59, letters, Healy to his wife. According to op. cit., de Mare, G. P. A. Healy, American Artist, 1954, pp.151-152, the Versailles Adams is dated “Washington, December 10, 1845.”

[235]The Life Portraits of John Quincy Adams, (City of Washington: The National Portrait Gallery, Smithsonian Institution, 1970), p.5 of introduction.

[236]Op. cit., de Mare, G. P. A. Healy, American Artist, 1954, p.149.

[237]Op. cit., Constans, Musée National du Château de Versailles, 1995, vol. 1, p.457. The portrait of Webster in the Musée de Versailles is signed and dated, “Healy pinxt/July 19th, 1846.”

[238] The Papers of Daniel Webster: Correspondence, Volume 6, 1844-1849, Charles M. Wiltse, editor, Wendy B. Tilghman, assistant editor, (Hanover, NH: Published for Dartmouth College by the University Press of New England, 1984), supplemental calendar, p.472. A letter from Webster to Edward Curtin, Oct. 3, “reports that George P.A. Healy is at Marshfield, trying to ‘fit me up’ for Louis Philippe and for Lord Ashburton.”

[239]Op. cit., The Papers of Daniel Webster: Correspondence, Vol. 6, 1844-1849, 1984, pp. 99-100. Healy  painted Caroline Le Roy Webster and Julia Webster Appleton “about 1845.”

[240]Philip Hone, The Diary of Philip Hone, 1828-1851, 11/12/1845, and 04/28/1845, consulted on microfiche, vols. 23-25, 4/9/1845 to 12/31/1847, reel no. 7, in the New-York Historical Society, New York.

[241]Op. cit., Philip Hone, The Diary of Philip Hone, 1828-1851, 04/28/1845; According to, Proceedings, Massachusetts Historical Society, ser. 2, vol. 2, p.217, in the Healy Papers, Hay Collection, Special Collections, New York Public Library, Healy painted Webster’s portrait “in the winter or spring of 1846,” in “one of the old committee rooms of Congress down in the very crypts of the capitol.” See, Letter, James Watson Webb, to General A. A. Webb, 01/14/1883, Albert Rosenthal Papers, Archives of American Art, microfilm roll D34, frame 1301, which indicates the Club’s Webster was made a tontine, owned first by Philip Hone, and then upon his death passed to another club member by a draw, and so on, until the last surviving club member became the owner. The cost of the painting, including frame, was $550.

[242] Healy’s first four children were, Arthur, Agnes, Mary and George. The two Healy boys died in 1850. Young George was about four at the time.

[243]Letter, Geo. P.A. Healy to Mrs. Rivers, from Philadelphia, 01/11/1846, The Historical Society of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, Archives of American Art, microfilm roll P22, frame 212.

[244] See, op. cit., Constans, Musée National du Château de Versailles, 1995, vol. 1, p.456. Healy’s bust portrait of Polk in the Musée de Versailles is signed and dated, “Healy pinxt/March 3rd 1846.”

[245] The bust portrait of Polk in the Corcoran Gallery of Art is signed and dated, “G.P.A. Healy/1846.” See, op. cit., Healy’s Sitters, 1950, p.67.

[246] See, Margaret C. S. Christman, 1846, Portrait of the Nation, (Washington, D.C.: Published by the Smithsonian Institution Press for the National Portrait Gallery, 1996), p.24.

[247] M. M. Quaife, editor, Diary of James Polk…01/15/1846 (1:165), 01/21/1846 (1:182), 04/06/1846 (1:318).

[248] See, op. cit., Christman, 1846, Portrait of the Nation, 1996, p.26.

[249] See, op. cit., Constans, Musée National du Château de Versailles, 1995, vol. 1, p.456. The portrait of Calhoun is signed and dated, “Healy pinxt/June 11th 1846.”

[250] See, op. cit., Constans, Musée National du Château de Versailles, 1995, vol. 1, p. 457. The portrait of Webster is signed and dated, “Healy pinxt/July 19th, 1846.”

[251] See, op. cit., Christman, 1846, Portrait of the Nation, 1996, p. 62, 193.

[252] See, op. cit., Constans, Musée National du Château de Versailles, 1995, vol. 1, pp.453-459. The eighteen portraits include the following: Henry Clay (300 francs); Daniel Webster (300 francs); John Caldwell Calhoun (300 francs); James Knox Polk (300 francs); Andrew Jackson (300 francs); John Quincy Adams (300 francs); James Madison (120 francs); Thomas Jefferson (120 francs); John Adams (120 francs); John Paul Jones (120 francs); Richard Auguste Warren (120 francs); Alexander Hamilton (120 francs); John Marshall (120 francs); Henry Knox (120 francs); Nathaniel Green (120 francs); John Jay (120 francs); John Hancock (120 francs); Benjamin Franklin (120 francs) ); (all eighteen, Musée national du Château de Versailles, France). For the portraits from life, Healy received 300 francs each. For his copies, which were all busts, he received 120 apiece. In total, Healy received 3,240 francs for the eighteen portraits See, op. cit., Livre d’Entrée (Inv. L-P), for record of dates that portraits entered Versailles, and, Inv. Ecole Française, 8536-9971, anonymes supplément, 9972-1019, for amounts paid Healy for the portraits

[253]Hereafter referred to as, Webster Replying to Hayne.

[254]Op. cit., Healy, Reminiscences…, 1894, p.162.

[255]Letter extract, Healy to unidentified man, from Boston, 04/18/1849, from Boston, in, Kindred Spirits the E. Maurice Bloch Collection of Manuscripts, Letters and Sketchbooks of American Artists, Mostly of the Nineteenth Century, (Boston : Ars Libri, 1992), p.39, “I saw Louis Philippe two years since last October i.e. in October 1846 when I obtained permission to return to this country to make the studies for a large picture of Webster replying to Hayne which I have been engaged upon ever since. I intend to paint this work in Paris, which will occupy me for two years and then I hope to return to settle in Boston.”

[256]In French, Franklin plaidant la cause des colonies américaines devant Louis XVI. Hereafter referred to as, Franklin Before Louis XVI.

[257]According to Albert Boime, in Thomas Couture and the Eclectic Vision, (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1980), pp.576-577, the two history paintings “were both sketched under the watchful eye of Couture,” and show Couture’s influence.

[258]Healy-DeMare Papers, unidentified biographical information, Archives of American Art, microfilm roll D130, frame 563.

[259]Letter, Healy to Mrs. Wheaton, 10/20/1846, J. Pierpont Morgan Library, New York, Archives of American Art, microfilm roll N68-12, frames 0376-0377, “On board the Britania, The Pilot takes this!”

[260]Op. cit., Letter, Healy to Mrs. Wheaton, 10/20/1846, “I delayed writing until now, that I might give you the latest account of ourselves … Arthur’s Healy’s eldest son grief almost broke my heart. The others are too young to feel the separation as acutely as he. It required some courage to tear myself away...”

[261]Op. cit., de Mare, G. P. A. Healy, American Artist, 1954, pp.156, 164.

[262]Op. cit., de Mare, G. P. A. Healy, American Artist, 1954, p.156.

[263]Letter, Healy to Francis Markoe, Washington, 04/18/1847, New York, Gratz Collection, in The Historical Society of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, Archives of American Art, microfilm roll P22, frames 213-.

[264]Op. cit., de Mare, G. P. A. Healy, American Artist, 1954, p.157.

[265]Op. cit., de Mare, G. P. A. Healy, American Artist, 1954, p.158.

[266]Op. cit., de Mare, G. P. A. Healy, American Artist, 1954, p.159; op. cit., Healy, 1893, p. 210.

[267]Op. cit., Healy, Reminiscences, 1894, pp.213, 226/

[268]Letter, Healy to Henry Wheaton, from Boston, 07/24/1847, J. Pierpont Morgan Library, New York, Archives of American Art, microfilm roll N68-12, frames 0378-0379.

[269]Op. cit., The Papers of Daniel Webster: Correspondence, Volume 6, 1844-1849, 1984, p.427.

[270]Op. cit., The Papers of Daniel Webster: Correspondence, Volume 6, 1844-1849, 1984, p.253.

[271]Op. cit., de Mare, G. P. A. Healy, American Artist, 1954, pp.160-161. De Mare writes that Healy called his three daughters, “My three capital daughters” for they were born in London, Paris and Washington, respectively; Edith Healy Hill, Recollections, (Hinsdale, IL: Privately Printed, 1930), chapter 1, n.p. In this source Edith writes that she was born in Washington and was “taken abroad” six months later.

[272]Vanina Costa, Musée d’Orsay (Paris: Scala, 1994), p.108. The Second Republic followed the July Monarchy. Louis-Napoleon, nephew of Napoleon I, became Emperor (Napoleon III) in December, 1848.

[273]Op. cit., Healy, Reminiscences…, 1894, p.124.

[274] Catalogue of the Twenty-Second Exhibition of Paintings and Statuary in the Athenaeum Gallery, (Boston: Eastburn’s Press, 1848), p.4, catalog nos. 10 (Portrait of a Lady), 86 (Louis Philippe).

[275]Op. cit., de Mare, G. P. A. Healy, American Artist, 1954, p.164.

[276]Op. cit., Healy, Reminiscences…, 1894, p.164; See, op. cit., Healy’s Sitters, 1950, p.23. The bust portrait in the Museum of Fine Arts, Virginia is signed and dated, “G.P.A. Healy Pinxt./Marshfield, Nov. 13th/1848.”

[277]Letter, Healy to Mrs. Allen, from Boston, 10/12/1848, Archives of American Art, microfilm roll D10, frame 1276. In this letter, Healy writes of his wife and children in France that, “Mrs. H. and the children were quite well when I heard last Friday.”

[278]The Literary World, “Fine Art Intelligence,” 03/10/1849, p.228.

[279]Op. cit., Letter extract, Healy to unidentified man, from Boston, 04/18/1849, from Boston, Kindred Spirits:…, 1992), p.39.

[280]See, A Description of Mr. Healey’s (sic) Picture of the Great Constitutional Debate in the Senate of the United States, January 26, 1830, with Biographical Sketches of Mr. Webster and General Hayne, (Cambridge: Metcalf and Company, 1851), p.33, and, op. cit, The Papers of Daniel Webster: Correspondence, Vol. 6, 1844-1849, 1984, p.462, Papers of Daniel Webster, Calendar, June 15, p.462.

[281]Letter, Healy to Hiram Powers, 11/11/1849, Hiram Powers Papers, National Collection of Fine Arts, Washington, D.C., Archives of American Art, microfilm roll 1134, frame 610.

[282]Letter, Healy to Hiram Powers, 04/17/1850, Hiram Powers Papers, National Collection of Fine Arts, Washington, D.C., Archives of American Art, microfilm roll 1134, frame 1041.

[283]Explication des ouvrages de peinture, sculpture, architecture, gravure et lithographie des artistes vivants, exposés au Palais national le 30 décembre 1850 (Paris: Vinchon, 1850), p.130, catalog nos. 1478 (Louis-Philippe), 1479 (Calhoun), 1480 (Mme…), 1481 (Mme H…et son enfant), 1482 (Mme Lesieur de Norfold (Virginie, Etats-Unis)), 1483 (Portrait), 1484 (M. le docteur Olliff), 1485 (fils de M. Corbin).

[284]Harper’s New Monthly Magazine, 01/1851, p.277; 05/1851, p.852. The artist was reported to have received $1,000 for the portrait.

[285]Op. cit., Graves, The Royal Academy of Arts:, 1906, vol. 4, p.54, catalog no. 415 (Calhoun). Healy did not exhibit again at the Royal Academy until 1866.

[286]Op. cit., de Mare, G. P. A. Healy, American Artist, 1954, p.168. The family had moved from Versailles to Paris in 1850.

[287]République Française, Préfecture du Département de la Seine, Acte de Décès, Archives de Paris, 11/04/1850, “Héaly, Arthur.” The family’s address is given as, rue de l’Arcade, 68.; Letter, Healy to Franklin Haven, 03/13/1851, Haven Collection, Massachusetts Historical Society, mentions the “loss of our two noble boys, our last and only son, our darling Arthur, was taken from us only four months since.”

[288]Op. cit., de Mare, G. P. A. Healy, American Artist, 1954, p.168.

[289]“Biographical notes about members of the Healy Family,” Healy Papers, Hay Collection, New York Public Library, Archives of American Art, microfilm roll D130, frame 513. Maria became a nun at age eighteen.

[290]Letter, Healy to Powers, 02/16/1851, Hiram Powers Papers, National Collection of Fine Arts, Washington, D.C., Archives of American Art, microfilm roll 1135, frame 1816.

[291]Letter, Healy to Daniel Webster, from Paris, 04/29/1851, Haven Collection, Massachusetts Historical Society, Boston. Healy paid a fee to exhibit the painting in the Boston Athenaeum in 1851. He was given permission to exhibit the painting in Faneuil Hall in 1852.

[292]Sally Webster, “Witnesses to History: George P.A. Healy’s Webster’s Reply to Hayne,” paper presented at the National Portrait Gallery, Washington, DC, for the symposium, “Portraiture in the Age of Photography, 1850-1910,” November 8, 1997, courtesy, William H. Gerdts Library.

[293]Cradle of Liberty: Faneuil Hall (Boston: Faneuil Hall, n.d.). One hundred and seventeen of the 130 portraits are identified (not counting Louis Philippe).

[294]Danielle Hughes, class paper for Prof. Sally Webster, The Graduate School and University Center, C.U.N.Y., fall 1994, p.8, curtesy, William H. Gerdts Library. The question of the identity of the figures in Healy’s painting is discussed in Hughes’ paper.

.[295] Richard P. Wunder, Hiram Powers, Vermont Sculptor, 1805-1873, (Newark: University of Delaware Press, 1991), v. 1, p.379.

[296]Letter, David McKibbin to Thomas R. Hay, 05/11/1953, Healy Papers, Hay Collection, Special Collections, New York Public Library. McKibben, of the Library of the Boston Athenaeum, writes to Hay, in answer to a question posed by Hay, that the Athenaeum record book, dated Sept. 27, 1851, indicates that $300 was received from Healy for rental of a portion of the “Picture Gallery” for exhibition of Healy’s Webster’s Reply to Hayne, for one month.

[297]Op. cit., A Description of Mr. Healey’s (sic) Picture of the Great Constitutional Debate…, 1851.

[298]Op. cit., de Mare, G. P. A. Healy, American Artist, 1954, p.171. Webster died in the following year, on October 24, 1852.

[299]R.W. Haskins, “Healy’s Great Picture,” Philadelphia Art-Union Reporter, vol. 1, no. 8, 09/1851, p.103.

[300]“Mr. Healey’s Webster and the Senate Chamber,” The Literary World, 10/11/1851, pp.290-291.

[301]Healy’s Great Picture of the constitutional Debate in the U.S. Senate, between Webster and Hayne, Embracing life-size portraits of Senators, and about of (sic) One hundred other notable persons; Canvas, 15 by 27 feet, now on exhibition at the Academy of Fine Arts, Chestnut Street…, (n.d.), Library Co. of Philadelphia, Archives of American Art, microfilm roll P9, frame 806.

[302]Boston Common Council Records, 05/31/1852, p.265, typescript copy made by John M. Carroll, Boston Public Library, enclosed in his letter to Mr. Hensley, dated 7/21/1953, regarding T.R. Hay’s inquiry on the subject, in the collection of the Boston Public Library.

[303]Boston Common Council Records, 12/30/1852, p.709, and, 12/31/1852, p.723, typescript copy made by John M. Carroll, Boston Public Library, enclosed in his letter to Mr. Hensley, dated 7/ 21/1953, regarding T.R. Hay’s inquiry on the subject, in the collection of the Boston Public Library.