behind AotW

This is the packet ship Saranak of the Cope Line entering port with a steam tug at Philadelphia, PA in a brilliant watercolor by David Johnson Kennedy of August 1851.

Irish-born Antietam veteran Colwell Carr of the First Pennsylvania Reserves was a passenger on that ship from Liverpool to Philadelphia in May 1849. He settled in Media just west of the city and was a wool dyer at the start of the Civil War.

The tenth of Colwell and Mary Waugh Carr’s eleven children was Richard Isaac Downey Carr (1876-1963). I’d love to hear from anyone who knows about his Downey namesake.

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The original of this painting is in the collection of the Historical Society of Philadelphia, and is online in their Digital Library.

See a little more about Thomas P Cope and his ships also online from the HSP.