| Title: | box
| | Type: | Container; Personal Gear
| | Materials: | cardboard, paper, ink, glass, mica, gold, hair, jet
| | Measurements: | overall: 3/4 in x 2 3/4 in x 1 7/8 in; 1.905 cm x 6.985 cm x 4.7625 cm
| | Accession Number: | HD 64.174
| | Credit Line: | Gift of Mrs. Dorothy Williams Hartigan
| | Museum Collection: | Historic Deerfield
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Description:
Small rectangular, cardboard trinket box with two lids (one or both not original), covered in blue-green with an octagonal-shaped engraving of boy walking with a sheep by his side pasted on the center lid and a band of tulip-shaped cutouts around the edges. The contents of the box include: glass inside cover with traces of mica and paper; gold hair pin engraved on the back with the initials "H W H" or "H M H" and a coil of hair behind glass; broken hair ring with hair behind glass; two gold studs; six small pieces of gold and jet pins and earrings. There is an undecipherable ink inscription on the bottom. The box came from the descendants of Dr. Stephen West Williams (1790-1855) of Deerfield, who married Harriet Taylor Goodhue (1799-1874) in 1818. Harriet was the daughter of Dr. Joseph Goodhue (1762-1849) who was a doctor at Fort Constitution, N.H., and moved to Deerfield by 1822. Stephen and Harriet had four children, one of whom, Dr. Edward Jenner Williams (1823-1881), studied medicine with his father and and then moved to Laona, Illinois, where he married Orilla Nancy Webster in 1856. Two of their three sons and their daughter lived to adulthood - Dr. Henry Smith Williams (1863-1943), Dr. Edward Huntington Williams (1868-1944), and Harriet Goodhue Williams Myers (1867-1949) who wrote a privately printed book (1945), "We Three, Henry, Eddie and Me: Henry Smith Williams, Edward Huntington Williams, Harriet Williams Myers." The donor, Dorothy Williams Hartigan, was the daugher of Henry Smith Williams and Florence Whitney Williams, and first cousin of Helen Myers Curtis and her sister, Neva Myers Brown, who were the daughters of Harriet Williams Myers and Raymond Myers. Both Mrs. Hartigan and Mrs. Curtis gave Historic Deerfield a number of Williams/Goodhue family pieces. NOTE: Although the box came from a Williams family descendent, there is no indication if this box is a family piece.
Link to share this object record:
https://museums.fivecolleges.edu/detail.php?t=objects&type=ext&id_number=HD+64.174 |
