42. Painting of Richard Montgomery

This oil on canvas portrait is of General Richard Montgomery, for whom Montgomery County was named in 1776. It was painted by Frank J. McKenzie, c.1933-1939, presumably as a commission from Bethesda physician Dr. Benjamin Cissel Perry (1881-1943).

Richard Montgomery (1738-1775) was an Irish soldier in the British Army who settled in New York in 1773. Taking up the patriot cause in the American Revolution, he was commissioned as a brigadier general in the Continental Army in June 1775. He succeeded to command of an invasion of Canada, capturing Montreal in November 1775. Under the command of Benedict Arnold, he led the New Year’s Eve attack on Quebec, but was killed during the battle. Honorably buried by the British, his remains were moved to New York City in 1818.

In 1776, Dr. Thomas Sprigg Wootton (c.1740-89) of lower Frederick County introduced a bill in the new Maryland General Assembly to subdivide the vast western county, creating counties named for two American heroes. Washington County to the northwest would be added a county named for General George Washington and Montgomery County to the southeast a county named for the late General Richard Montgomery. This effort to provide easier access to more representative self-government through smaller counties was only narrowly approved on October 1, 1776.

Fast forward more than 160 years to Dr. Benjamin Perry, born in Kensington and active in Montgomery County affairs. He served as President of the County Board of Commissioners and Vice President of the Bank of Bethesda. He first began practicing medicine at Urbana in Frederick County. In 1929, about 12 years after establishing his Bethesda practice, Perry built the extant three-story brick building at 7349 Wisconsin Avenue reflective of architecture of the early 1800s.

This painting from Dr. Perry’s collection was donated by Judge Stedman Prescott (1896-1968) on May 17, 1954, at the Montgomery County Historical Society’s first meeting at the Glenview mansion, its headquarters until 1957. Prescott, born in Norbeck, had an illustrious government career in his native county: Rockville City Council (1924-1930), state’s attorney (1930-1934), state senator (1935-1938), and judge of the Circuit Court (1938-1958).

Formally trained, London-born artist Frank Joseph MacKenzie (1865-1939) lived in San Francisco but also maintained a studio-home in Washington, D.C., since his wife, Florence Louise Bryant (1890-1968), was the head artist for the Department of Agriculture’s Bureau of Exhibits. MacKenzie, who had come to the United States to design the Boer War exhibit at the St. Louis World's Fair of 1904, painted museum dioramas for many museums, including the natural history museums in New York, Los Angeles, and San Francisco.

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