National Portrait Gallery, Smithsonian Institution; transfer from the National Gallery of Art; gift of the A.W. Mellon Educational and Charitable Trust, 1942 J.M. Cline, New Orleans; purchased 3 July 1923 by Thomas B. Clarke [1838-1931], New York; purchased 29 January 1936 by The A.W. Mellon Educational and Charitable Trust, Pittsburgh; gift 1942 to National Gallery of Art; transferred 1965 to NPG. Notes: “J.M. Cline/ New Orleans/ 7/3/23/ $300” in NGA annotated Clarke catalog 1928 NGA. The entry for the painting reads: “Purchased from Milo Ferguson, son of Judge John Howard Ferguson who got the portrait in 1880 from a Mr. McCarthy of Algiers, La. in payment for attorney fees. It came to his family from Henry Clay.”
