A Trip Through the Portrait Gallery (2)

As we move through the hall at the Harrison House, another face gazes down at us . . .

I think our Curator Cat senses that he’d better be on his best behavior!

The portrait you see here is of Maria Williams, around 1870. Maria married Amos Williams, the man who purchased the land and built what became the Harrison House! Here’s what the book A Small House in New Jersey has to say about Maria:

“On December 10, 1834, Amos Williams, the widower, married Maria Cooley at her parents’ home in West Milford, New Jersey. He was forty-one, about ten years older than his bride. He must have met Maria through the minister who married them, the Reverend Joseph Moore, pastor of the West Milford Presbyterian Church . . . It is likely that one of Amos Williams’s motives in marrying for the second time in 1834 was to provide his sons with a new mother. This was a primary concern for Maria when she came to Centreville, bearing with her fine handwoven linens, good china, and silver candlesticks. She could noit have been a kinder stepmother, but little is known about her relationships with her stepchildren.”

Stay tuned for another new face next week!