Description:
Needlework sampler done in silk floss embroidery in blue, golden brown, cream, yellow and green in cross stitch on a loosely-woven linen ground, which has the inscription, "Caroline Bardwell / AE 13 1807." Caroline Bardwell (1794-1855) was the daughter of Thomas Bardwell (1744-1826) of the Cheapside section of Deerfield and Caroline Seekins Bardwell (1769-1855) who married in 1780. Caroline married Ralph Arms (1791-1851) in 1816. The original paper on the back of the frame (see data file) is inscribed in ink: "This sampler was worked by my grandmother (my mother's / mother) when she was 13 year old in 1807. Her name was / Catherine Bardwell. / Fanny C. Wilson Moore / Mounted and framed in 1894." The top of the paper had a label from a Boston framer. Fanny Wilson Moore was the daughter of Mary Ann Jackson Arms (b.1836) who married Frederick M. Wilson of Bellows Falls, NY, in 1856; and granddaughter of Caroline Bardwell Arms and Ralph Arms. The sampler then descended through another branch of the family, Mary Ann's brother, Otis B. Arms (1816-1886) who married Sarah M. Watkins (d.1884) in 1842. Their daughter, Lizzie Sarah Arms (b.1852) married Henry F. King in 1875; Lizzie's and Henry's son, Henry Otis King had a daughter, Gertrude King, through whom the sampler went to Pierre Bedard. The sampler has five rows of the alphabets in cursive, capital and small letters separated by five lines made of a variety of decorative sitches; over a large fruit basket flanked by two dogs facing it, stylized flowers and two pine trees; and a three-sided vine border. Bardwell's sampler is characteristic of those in the “White Dove” style. Although there are no black-outlined, paired white birds on this example, there are several other motifs common to this style, including the basket of fruit and flowers, pine trees, and black dogs. The inclusion of Caroline’s name, age and date she completed her sampler surrounded by a cartouche is another characteristic of White Dove samplers, which flourished in this area between about 1790 and the early 1830s.
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https://museums.fivecolleges.edu/detail.php?t=objects&type=ext&id_number=HD+F.894 |
