Images(4)

Portrait of Kinheche

Date1830

Artist Caroline Dudley ((1802 - 1832))

OriginAmerica, Tennessee, Franklin

MediumWatercolor on ivory

DimensionsSight: 2 3/4 × 2 1/4in. (7 × 5.7cm) Framed: 6 × 5in.

Credit LineMuseum Purchase, The Friends of Colonial Williamsburg Collections Fund

Object number2022.300.1

DescriptionPortrait of a American Indian man dressed in an orange, fringed hunting shirt with silver arm bands, a set of three silver nested gorgets around his neck, and a silver headband around a turban with attached black ostrich feathers. In his right hand he is holding a bow and appears to have the hilt of either a dagger or dirk at his waist.
Original frame (B).
Label TextThis small likeness was painted by Caroline Dudley of Franklin, Tennessee, in August 1830. She and her father, Guilford Dudley, were among the spectators invited to witness the treaty summit between President Andrew Jackson and the Chickasaw Nation. According to family lore, Caroline was so impressed by the appearance of Kinheche that she invited him to come to the Dudley’s home to sit for this portrait.

Many of the Chickasaw dignitaries selected for the Franklin Summit were those who had fought in the Creek War, including Kinheche. Kinheche served as a corporal under William McIntosh, or Tustunnuggee Hutke (White Warrior), a prominent chief of the Lower Creeks who allied with the United States government during the War of 1812.

ProvenanceThe portrait descended throught the family of the artist's sister, Frances Bland Dudley Crockett, to its last private owner, Mary Bright Wilson of Lincoln County, Tennessee. Mary Bright Wilson left the portrait to the Lincoln County Museum in Fayetteville, Tennessee upon her death in 2004.