Catharine Wolf's 1827 Needlework Sampler from Esther R. Barton's School

Pennsylvania, 1827, silk on linen, with "Catharine Wolf worked this sam- / Pler in the 12th year of her age in / Miss Esther R Barton's / School. 1827" to center, surrounded by detached floral and fauna motifs including butterfly, baskets of flowers, and birds, with twining rosebud border, green ribbon stitched to edges, presented in frame.

Frame 18 3/4 x 20 1/4 in.; sight 17 1/4 x 18 1/2 in.

From the Collection of Josephine Chapman Borthwick, Pinehurst, North Carolina

The young girl who stitched this sampler may have been Catharine Wolff of Lancaster, Pennsylvania, born in 1815 to John and Salome Wolff, and in fact the initials "JSW" are stitched in the floral wreath at the upper center of the sampler and would have been the initials of a parent or close relative. Catharine Wolff of Lancaster died a single woman in 1896, her obituary stating that she was, "a woman of sterling qualities and strong common sense."

Esther Rittenhouse Barton of Lancaster, Pennsylvania, was born in 1799 and died in 1870, unmarried. She operated a girls school attended by, among others, the poet Louise Esther Vickroy Boyd.

Significant fading; discoloration; loss to ribbon border; not examined out of frame.