Page 14 - Demo

10Elizabeth Shreve, Burlington County, New Jersey, 1807Quaker instructresses and samplermakers of Burlington County, New Jersey are widely credited with creating one of the finest bodies of work within American samplers. We have been fortunate to own many outstanding examples over the years, and recently acquired Elizabeth Shreve%u2019s work of 1807. This sampler is rendered even more interesting as we have previously handled the extraordinary sampler made Elizabeth%u2019s daughter, Rachel Cook, in 1823. Job Shreve (1755-1826) and Elizabeth Gauntt (1763-1827) were members of the Upper Springfield Monthly Meeting; both families had long been members of the Society of Friends and had been in Burlington County for many generations. Notably, Elizabeth Gauntt%u2019s great uncle was John Woolman (1720-1776), the famed Quaker preacher, author and activist. The births of the eleven children of Job and Elizabeth Shreve were recorded in the minutes of the Upper Springfield Monthly Meeting and our samplermaker was born on October 27, 1789. She dated her sampler, using Quaker phrasing, %u201cThe 10th Month 1807,%u201d having worked it when she was 18 years old. In 1811, Elizabeth married Richard Cook, again recorded by the Monthly Meeting, and they became the parents of six children. By 1838 the family removed to Philadelphia where they joined the Green Street Meeting. Photocopies of many of the handwritten Friends%u2019 records, including marriage certificates, are included in the file that accompanies the sampler. Elizabeth died in 1853 in London and is buried at the Whitechapel Burial Ground. (continued on the next page)