This quarter-plate-sized daguerreotype captures Ms. Madison in her late 70s
The Smithsonian Institution's National Portrait Gallery has acquired what is believed to be the earliest known photograph of a US First Lady. The daguerreotype, an image created using the first photographic process, depicts Dolley Madison, the wife of the fourth US president, James Madison.
According to the museum, this recently discovered photograph likely dates back to 1846. The Smithsonian Institution purchased the daguerreotype for $456,000 at a Sotheby's auction held in June.
The portrait is "one of exceedingly few surviving photographs of the woman who has defined for two centuries what it means to be the First Lady of the United States of America", Sotheby's said in a statement.
The auction company reported that the photograph was discovered during the cleanup of a basement following the death of a relative, BBC reported. This quarter-plate-sized daguerreotype, taken by John Plumbe Jr., captures Ms. Madison in her late 70s, likely in late spring or early summer of 1846, as noted by the Smithsonian Institution.
John Plumbe Jr., originally an English entrepreneur who later pursued photography, is also credited with producing the earliest known photographs of the US Capitol. Born into a Quaker family in North Carolina in 1768, Dolley Madison married James Madison in 1794.
During her time as first lady, she was renowned for her hospitality and for becoming a central figure in Washington's social scene while her husband served as president from 1809 to 1817, according to the White House Historical Association.
This photograph of Dolley Madison now joins the National Portrait Gallery's collection, which includes approximately 230 portraits of first ladies. The acquisition follows the gallery's purchase of the first known photograph of a US president 1843 daguerreotype of John Quincy Adams-in 2017.