BOSTON, 1750-90

Exhibiting classic Boston craftsmanship from the eighteenth century, this block-front chest-of-drawers is distinguished by its recorded history in an illustrious family. As transcribed by Ethel Isadore Brown (1872-1944) in 1935, the chest was previously owned by Lucy Ann Davenport (b. 1797) of Dorchester, Massachusetts and through the nineteenth century, descended directly along the female lines to Edith Blake Brown (1869-1907), the sister of the author of the note. Lucy was too young to have been the chest's first owner, but perhaps as its later passage of ownership suggests, it had been a gift from her mother, Elizabeth Wiswell (1764-1844). In 1782, Elizabeth married Lucy's father, Samuel Davenport (1757-1802), a patriot who served during the Battles of Concord and Lexington, and their marriage may have occasioned the commission of the chest (see Sons of the American Revolution Membership Applications, 1889-1970, vol. 103, SAR Membership Number 20474, available at ancestry.com). The chest descended to Lucy's great-granddaughter, Edith Blake (Brown) Wilkie (1869-1907), a renowned artist, designer and interior decorator whose papers are in the collection of Winterthur Museum ("Overview of the Collection," Edith Blake Brown Papers, The Winterthur Library, The Joseph Downs Collection of Manuscripts and Printed Ephemera, Col. 218).