Mrs. Robert Young Hayne (Rebecca Brewton Motte Alston)

ith her patterned pink shawl, lacy gown, and hair in a magnificent mountain of curls, Rebecca Hayne is the pinnacle of antebellum Southern style and wealth. This portrait was painted around the time of this Charleston heiress’s marriage to Robert Hayne, who later became a U.S. senator and the governor of South Carolina. Though local portrait artists were available, the Haynes employed the more prestigious services of a visiting young painter from New York. Samuel Morse later became famous for inventing the telegraph and Morse Code.

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