Martha Hale Dandridge Perkins

Photograph

Patrick Henry's Red Hill

Name/Title

Martha Hale Dandridge Perkins

Entry/Object ID

2023.30.9

Description

Photographic portrait of Martha Hale Dandridge Perkins adhered to a dark matte with an embossed frame and decorations. The sitter is wearing a dark-colored dress and a pale head covering with lace and ribbon. Inscription on the back reads: Grand Ma Perkins who was a Mrs. Martha Dandridge & Married Wm. Winston Fontaine and then Married _ Perkins.

Made/Created

Studio

Campbell & Son Artists

Notes

Original

Provenance

Notes

Martha Hale Dandridge was born on September 23, 1795, at "Yellow House" in Hanover County to Nathaniel West Dandridge, Jr. and Sarah Biggar Watson. She married William Winston Fontaine (1786-1816), a grandson of Patrick Henry, on January 16, 1810, and they had three children: William Spotswood Fontaine, Patrick Henry Fontaine, and Sarah Ann Fontaine. After William Winston Fontaine died in 1816, she remarried to William Perkins (1785-1849) on March 13, 1830. There are no documented children between them. Martha died on April 7, 1875, at the home of her grandson in Reidsville (Rockingham County), North Carolina. This photograph was given to PHMF on May 3, 2023, by Monique and Philip Heller. They inherited this object and the others in this accession from her stepmother, Catherine Spotswood Fontaine Lawrence (1938-2015), a third-great-granddaughter of Patrick Henry. Martha Hale Dandridge was her great-great-grandmother.