CLARKTON — Anna Mathilda McNeill Whistler, was the mother of the artist James Abbott McNeill Whistler and the subject of her son’s painting popularly known as Whistler’s Mother, though actually titled “Arrangement in Grey and Black.”

This painting hangs in the Musée d’Orsay in Paris, France.

Anna’s father, a physician educated at the University of Edinburgh, settled in North Carolina about 1785 and set up a medical practice in Wilmington. It was here that Anna Mathilda McNeill was born, the fifth of six children.

As a young girl Anna met and became quite impressed by Cadet George Washington Whistler, a classmate of her brother William at West Point.

Before William and Whistler graduated, Dr. McNeill left Wilmington to practice in New York.

In 1819 William and George received their commissions, and George Whistler married one of Anna’s closest friends, who died in 1827, leaving George Whistler with three small children, George, Joseph and Deborah.

George Whistler’s wife Mary had told George Whistler on her deathbed that if he were to remarry it must be to Anna and no one else. They were married in New York on Nov. 3 1831, and for the children “Aunt Annie” became “Mother.”

George and Anna’s first child was born in November 1883 and christened James Abbott Whistler (he later changed the Abbott to McNeill).

The painting was finished in 1871, while James Anna and their family were living in London. James sold the piece for 4,000 francs to the French government.

David Kennard is the editor of The Robesonian in Lumberton. Contact him at dkennard@robesonian or 910-416-5847.