A Double Portrait Miniature of the Artist's Wife, Harriet Stiles Ball Dodson, and Daughter, Sarah Ball Dodson

Richard Whatcoat Dodson (1812-1867) worked predominantly in Philadelphia as an engraver, illustrator, and portrait artist. Born in Cambridge, Maryland, Dodson exhibited at the Artist's Fund Society in Philadelphia as well as at the Apollo Gallery in New York City between 1837 and 1843; he died in Cape May, New Jersey. See Groce & Wallace, The New-York Historical Society's Dictionary of Artists in America, 1564-1860, (New York, 1952) p. 182.

Sarah Paxton Ball Dodson (1847-1906), the daughter of Harriet Stiles Ball and Richard Whatcoat Dodson, went on to become a leading American expatriate artist. She exhibited in the Paris Salon and ultimately settled in Brighton, England, where she continued painting.