$1,000
Estimate: $2,000 - $3,000
American Furniture, Decorative & Folk Art
Auction: April 19, 2016 11:00:00 AM EDT
Oil on canvas, framed.
19 1/2 in. x 15 in. (sight)After a painting by George Caleb Bingham, The Mill Boy, 1844, which depicted Henry Clay as a little boy riding the family horse to Mrs. Darricott's mill across the Virginian swampy lowlands known as the "slashes." The image was used on a banner to rally delegates at the Whig convention: The Whig Clarion, Raleigh, North Carolina, May 15, 1844, describes said banner: "With the Milford delegation came a banner on one side of which was represented "the Mill Boy of the Slashes returning from the Mill...On the other side was a wreath with thirteen silver stars above it, an Eagle grasping with his talons a shield and spears, and holding in his beak a ribbon, on which was inscribed, 'E. Pluribus Unum!" At this point of the procession was a boy on horseback, with a meal bag, intended to represent Henry Clay in his early youth..."