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  • Lemuel Shaw, Lost and Found
  • Ross Martin

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Chief Justice Lemuel Shaw at about fifty, by Francis Alexander.

Photo courtesy of the Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts.

On February 7, 2017, Cliff Allen of Boston's John Adams Courthouse made a public appeal for any information regarding a mystery portrait hanging outside of Chief Justice Gants's chambers. I saw the announcement that day and said to myself: "I know that face, but not this [End Page 181] portrait—it's Shaw!" I contacted the Courthouse to notify them that they had an unidentified image of Chief Justice Lemuel Shaw (1781–1861), who served on the state's highest court from 1830 until 1860—delivering some of the most consequential legal opinions in American history—and was Herman Melville's father-in-law. My argument (with the help of my art curator wife, Mary) provided crucial contextual evidence in Allen's investigation, and I quickly began obsessing over the painting's missing provenance record. As Allen described the series of events, "the tipping point came when they heard from a PhD candidate at the University of Michigan, whose case was particularly compelling. 'He had written his thesis at Columbia on Lemuel Shaw,' said Allen." (See the article and audio by Edgar B. Herwick, "How A Longtime SJC Employee And The Public Cracked The Case Of The Mystery Portrait," The Curiosity Desk, WGBH, Web, April 4, 2018.) I was the first to identify Shaw; over the course of a few months, I provided archival evidence to map out a full provenance report and visited the Courthouse's material collection to confirm all findings.

By the end of March, Allen closed the case, tentatively named Shaw, and judiciously credited everyone involved; however, I was still conducting research for him and soon was able to submit my findings. I concluded with confidence that the portrait is one of ten images of Shaw in the Courthouse, painted around 1830, likely by Francis Alexander, when Shaw was fifty and ascending the bench. These images are among other portraits, bust statues, and daguerreotypes of Shaw in Massachusetts, the most famous being William Morris Hunt's painting at the Essex Superior Court in Salem and the least well-known being Alfred Ordway's painting at the Gorham Street Courthouse in Lowell. In 1934, the "mystery" portrait arrived after the death of Shaw's granddaughter, Josephine MacC Shaw (1848–1933), through her associate Constance J. Bessey ("Portrait of Justice Shaw for Suffolk Courthouse," Daily Boston Globe [January 10, 1934]: 13). Josephine Shaw and Constance Bessey were affiliated through the Ellen M. Gifford Sheltering Home Corporation, as well as other social and charitable venues. Credit is due to Jeffrey Croteau, Director of Library & Archives at the Scottish Rite Masonic Museum and Library in Lexington, Massachusetts, who, working independently from me, was the first to bring the Boston Globe article to Allen's attention.

Shaw's second wife (m. 1827), Hope Savage (1793–1879), was also painted by Francis Alexander, so the newly identified portrait is likely one of two marriage portraits done during the limited time Alexander painted in Boston before leaving for Europe. Frank W. Bayley donated a portrait of Hope Savage Shaw by Alexander to the Massachusetts Historical Society in 1916, likely from the estate of Samuel Savage Shaw (1833–1915). During these years, Shaw's future relatives Major Thomas Melvill and his wife Priscilla had portraits [End Page 182] done in a similar style by Alexander, which are presently kept in the Old State-house Museum. A young Alexander had temporarily established himself in Boston around 1828 and rapidly painted unsigned portraits for Shaw's circle in the popular style of Gilbert Stuart. This Shaw portrait represents Alexander's early work before he traveled to Europe, built his reputation, and developed his own style seen in the portraits done during his second period in Boston.


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Chief Justice Lemuel Shaw in mid-seventies, by "an unknown artist."

Courtesy of the Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts.

Prior to 1934, two other oil portraits of Shaw belonged to (and still hang at) the Court, one in...

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