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Did Dolley Madison really save Washingtons portrait from the British?

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Did Dolley Madison really save Washingtons portrait from the British?

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According to Madison’s slave and personal valet, Paul Jennings, she did not. According to Jennings, “It has often been stated in print, that when Mrs. Madison escaped from the White House, she cut out from the frame the large portrait of Washington (now in one of the parlors there), and carried it off. This is totally false. She had no time for doing it. It would have required a ladder to get it down. All she carried off was the silver in her reticule, as the British were thought to be but a few squares off, and were expected every moment. John Suse’ [Jean-Pierre Sioussat] ( a Frenchman, then door-keeper, and still living) and Magraw, the President’s gardener, took it down and sent it off on a wagon, with some large silver urns and such other valuables as could be hastily got hold of.

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