The following is a letter regarding the location and owner of the original portrait of Esther Fairfield Wheatly Campbell. It is a copy of a letter in the possession of the public library in Oxford, MA.

WILLIAM A. STIMSON

3256 WASHINGTON STREET

SAN FRANCISCO, CALIF. 94115

                                                                                   Dec. 13, 2000

Ms Janice Moore

Oxford Historical Commission

3 West St.

Oxford, Mass 01540

Dear Ms Moore,

It has been a long time, since 1983, when we corresponded. If you are not involved in the Historical Commission any longer, I hope you will turn this letter over to the appropriate parties.

I am a descendant of Rev. John Campbell of Oxford, and we corresponded then about the painting of Esther F. W. Campbell, the copy of which hangs in the Oxford Library. You then forwarded a nice photo of the painting to me which I still have. My family and I visited Oxford in 1983 and we saw the painting in person.

The original painting has been handed down by successive generations of the Campbell family to the Shaws, then to the Putnams. It went from Frances Putnam in Saratoga Springs to Jessie Putnam Sullivan in St. Louis. Her daughter Louise S. Mulcahy had the painting in her living room until her death at age 103 earlier this year. She left the painting to me and it now hangs over my fireplace in my home her in San Francisco. I enclose a photo of it for your records. Louise Mulcahy was my mother’s first cousin. My mother was Mildred Putnam Stimson, the grandniece of Frances Putnam, and the niece of Jessie Putnam Sullivan.

I am writing this letter to let you of the Oxford Historical Commission know the whereabouts of the original oil portrait for your records.

I am proud to own this painting, done in 1714, as it has not only historical significance, but Esther is my 6-great grandmother! It is nice that the painting is still in the family and still appreciated. I hope my daughters will continue the tradition.

Sincerely,

(The original is signed by W. A. Stimson)

The following is excerpted from “The Records of Oxford” written by Mary deWitt Freedland (1894) regarding the portrait of Esther F. W. Campbell. Page 470, “Biographical Sketches.” A ‘copy’ of her portrait is at the public library in Oxford, MA.

            “The original portrait of Madame Esther Campbell, painted when 17 years of age, was in the possession of her son, Capt. William Campbell whose home was ever with his mother. Mrs. Campbell died of the smallpox, March 11, 1777. At his decease it was presented by him to his daughter Sarah, who married Dr. Shaw of Putney, Vt., and at her decease, to her son, Hon. Henry Shaw of Lanesboro, Mass. Through the kindness of Mrs. Shaw a copy was permitted, the only one ever taken. In Madame Campbell’s portrait she is represented in the character of Proserpina, a goddess of harvesting, as was the fashion for ladies in her time to assume a character. It was painted by Cooper, a famed artist in Edinburgh, 1717.”