High Chest
A: 55 3/8 × 46 1/8 × 21 3/4 inches (140.65 × 117.16 × 55.25 cm)
B: 34 1/2 × 45 5/8 × 23 5/8 inches (87.63 × 115.89 × 60.01 cm)
Joshua Thomas Owen (1821-1887), Philadelphia, PA, by 1887 [1];
By descent to his daughters, Mary Dale "Minnie" Owen (1864-1945) and probably Elizabeth Grey "Bessie" Owen (b. 1860), Chestnut Hill, PA [2];
Purchased from the Owens by Roland L. Taylor (1868-1943), Philadelphia, PA, probably by July 6, 1928-1933 [3];
Purchased from Taylor, through White, Allom and Co., and John Wise, Ltd., by The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, MO, 1933 [4].
NOTES:
[1] Brigadier General Joshua Thomas Owen commanded the Union Army's Philadelphia Brigade during part of the Civil War, including during the Battle of Chancellorsville in May 1863.
[2] According to S. W. Woodhouse, Jr., former curator, Philadelphia Museum of Art, in a letter to Roland L. Taylor, February 28, 1933, copy in Nelson-Atkins curatorial files: "When I first saw the highboy in the bedroom of Miss Minnie Owens at Sixteenth and Locust streets, she informed me that it had come to her sister and her by inheritance from Anne, the daughter of Nathan Garrett of Darby; and Anne Oborn, the daughter of Eliza Knowles and niece of Anne Garrett's husband; through the Grays (from whom Gray's Ferry takes its name) to their parents. Their father was General Owens of the Pennsylvania Troops in the Civil War. They removed it from the old house in Darby. The highboy never had been out of their family until it was purchased by you." The other Owen sister is not named, but was likely Elizabeth. Although Elizabeth's date of death is currently unknown, the only other possibility would have been Caroline Duke "Carrie" Owen (1875-1917), but she was likely no longer living when the chest was sold to Taylor.
[3] In a letter to Paul Gardner, Nelson-Atkins Director, dated February 19, 1934, Charles O. Cornelius, Nelson-Atkins advisor on American art, wrote about this chest, "The owner, Mr. Taylor sent it to White Allom to sell and they in turn consigned it to John Wise Ltd."
[4] In a letter dated July 6, 1928, Fiske Kimball, Director, Philadelphia Museum of Art, writes to Taylor about a "Philadelphia highboy" in Taylor's collection that is undergoing conservation with White, Allom & Co. Based on the description, this is likely the Nelson-Atkins chest.
