Hillhouse, Phineas P. Mrs.; Van Renssalaer, Caroline Matilda
Biography
Caroline Matilda Van Rensselaer was the daughter of Sarah A. Van Rensselaer, in turn the daughter of James Taylor, and the stepdaughter of his second wife Caroline Matilda Yates Taylor [1976-1866]. Caroline Matilda Yates was the daughter of Lawrence Reid Yates [d. 1796] and his wife Matilda Caroline Cruger [1776-1812], married in 1795. Matilda was one of six children of Henry Cruger [1739-1827], of New York, and his second wife Elizabeth Blair. Cruger was a merchant in Bristol, England, where Matilda was born and where Cruger served as mayor in 1781 before coming to America in 1790, where he was elected to the New York State Senate in 1792. Lawrence Yates was the junior partner in the New York importing firm run by his brother Richard Yates. After Lawrence Yates' death, Matilda married Judge Henry Walton (1768-1844), of Saratoga Springs, New York. Richard Yates' had two daughters, Catherine and Sophia, who married brothers, George and Carlile Pollock; after Lawrence's death George Pollock entered the Yates business firm as a partner. The three Yates/Pollock families had adjoining country houses on the banks of the Hudson. The Yates/Pollock families were subjects of portraits by Gilbert Stuart, now in NGA: Mrs. Richard Yates (1940.1.4), Richard Yates (1942.8.29), Catherine Yates Pollock (1942.8.19) and George Pollock (1942.8.18), as well as Matilda Cruger Yates (1942.8.13)and Lawrence Reid Yates (1940.1.5). [Information from Dr. Ellen Miles' forthcoming systematic catalogue volume on American Paintings and from sources and references recorded on CMS]