c. 1820 Captain John Cassin, U.S. Navy, Reverse Painted Glass Gold & Black Silhouette Bust Portrait with Gold Ink-Inscribed Identification below, in its original Walnut Frame with Gilt Inner Border, Choice Extremely Fine.
This museum quality Reverse Painting on Glass Silhouette Portrait is displayed in its original frame measuring 7 x 6.25 inches and the Portrait 4 x 3.75 inches (by sight). It depicts later Commodore John Cassin of the United States Navy in right-facing bust his naval dress uniform coat, double epaulettes, all rendered with considerable skill. This portrait is part of a well-established, but largely anonymous early American decorative tradition, in which fine linear detail were painted directly onto the back of the glass rather than cut from paper. This technique was favored for keepsake portraits of military and naval officers in this period. Below the painted silhouette, in neat contemporary ink lettering, this portrait is inscribed, "Capt. John Cassin. / U.S. Navy."

John Cassin (1760-1822), served as an officer in the Continental Army at the Battle of Trenton before entering the United States Navy, where he rose to command. During the War of 1812 he led the naval defense of the Delaware River in protection of Philadelphia, and from 1812 until 1821 served as Commandant of the Gosport (Norfolk) Navy Yard, personally overseeing its defenses against an anticipated British attack in 1814. His son, Stephen Cassin, commanded the USS Ticonderoga at the Battle of Lake Champlain and was Awarded a Congressional Gold Medal for his conduct in that action. The Portrait has a cream colored background within the walnut frame with a decorative gilt inner border having excellent crisp eye appeal, and bears a tag stating, Provenance: "Collection of Lord Revelstoke." (Baron Revelstoke is a British peerage title created in 1885 for Edward Charles Baring, head of Barings Bank.)


Baron Revelstoke is a British peerage title created in 1885 for Edward Charles Baring, head of Barings Bank, and held since by successive generations of the Baring family (2nd Baron John Baring; 3rd Baron Cecil Baring, whose American wife Maude Lorillard Tailer connected the family to old New York society; down to the current 7th Baron). The Barings were prolific collectors and had significant American connections. The white printed tag on the reverse is the current connection to this attribution of provenance. Barings Bank was a British merchant bank based in London. It was one of England's oldest merchant banks after Berenberg Bank, Barings' close collaborator and German representative. It was founded in 1762 by Francis Baring, a British-born member of the German-British Baring family of merchants and bankers.

John Cassin married Ann Wilcox (1754-1821) of Philadelphia in the early 1780s.