# Member of the Washington Family

- By: James Peale (born Chestertown, MD 1749-died Philadelphia, PA 1831)
- Date: ca. 1795
- Medium: watercolor on ivory
- Classification: Paintings
- Dimensions: sight 2 x 1 5/8 in. (5.1 x 4.1 cm) oval
- Culture: Washington
- Credit line: Smithsonian American Art Museum, Museum purchase through the Catherine Walden Myer Fund
- Museum: [Smithsonian Institution](https://americanart.si.edu/collections/search/artwork/?id=19306)
- Rights: [CC0 (Smithsonian Open Access)](https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/)
- Picture: https://invisiblenetwork.ai/thumbs/web/5de5644ee02794ceddfb096d93d5d990.jpg
- Who can see it: Tweens profiles and older (museums give no ratings; placed by Invisible Network from the museum's own words)

Family lore holds that this brooch pin features the portrait of an illegitimate son of George Washington, fathered when Washington was eighteen years old. Washington lent financial support to neighbors and members of his extended family at Mount Vernon, making it difficult to determine how accurate that legend is. One theory is that this is the likeness of Corbin Washington (1765-1799), who married Hannah Lee, a daughter of Richard Henry Lee, in whose family this miniature descended.