Appletons' Cyclopædia of American Biography/Stebbins, Emma

STEBBINS, Emma, artist, b. in New York city, 1 Sept., 1815; d. there, 25 Oct., 1882. For several years she devoted herself to painting in oil and water-colors, working also in crayon and pastels. She subsequently turned her attention to sculpture. In 1857 she went to Rome, where she studied under an Italian master, and also with Paul Akers. She executed a large fountain representing “The Angel of the Waters” (1860-'2) in Central park, New York; a statue of Horace Mann in Boston (1860); “Joseph,” “The Angel of Prayer,” and a bust of Charlotte Cushman (1859); a bust of John W. Stebbins in the Mercantile library, New York; and other works. While in Rome she won the friendship of Charlotte Cushman, with whom she returned to the United States in 1870. She prepared a memoir of Miss Cushman, at her request, after the actress's death (Boston, 1878).