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Source Description
This deluxe commercial souvenir commemorates the marriage of “General” Tom Thumb (Charles Sherwood Stratton) and Lavinia Warren, performers at P. T. Barnum’s American Museum. Thumb was such a celebrity that the wedding pushed the Civil War off newspapers’ front pages for days. Cartes-de-visite of the wedding sold in the thousands; Brady even licensed the image to lithographers and other photographers. In one image, Lavinia holds a baby who was borrowed for the photo shoot to suggest her domestic skills. The locket is shaped like a miniature suitcase bearing the words “Somebody’s Luggage,” the title of an 1862 story by Charles Dickens.
Scholar Source Context
Document identity
localId
172558
label
Somebody's Luggage (Miniature Wedding Album of Tom Thumb and Lavinia Warren)
core
obj
dtoType
object
pageCount
1
Source metadata
id
172558
contentType
object
title
Somebody's Luggage (Miniature Wedding Album of Tom Thumb and Lavinia Warren)
description
This deluxe commercial souvenir commemorates the marriage of “General” Tom Thumb (Charles Sherwood Stratton) and Lavinia Warren, performers at P. T. Barnum’s American Museum. Thumb was such a celebrity that the wedding pushed the Civil War off newspapers’ front pages for days. Cartes-de-visite of the wedding sold in the thousands; Brady even licensed the image to lithographers and other photographers. In one image, Lavinia holds a baby who was borrowed for the photo shoot to suggest her domestic skills. The locket is shaped like a miniature suitcase bearing the words “Somebody’s Luggage,” the title of an 1862 story by Charles Dickens.
date
c. 1863
citation
rights
CC0
rightsUri
CC0
language
en
wikidata
Q80084680
creators
268
genreSpecific
Jewelry
imageCount
1
source
import
dimensionsRaw
Overall: 2.7 x 2 x 1 cm (1 1/16 x 13/16 x 3/8 in.); Each: 2.3 x 2 cm (7/8 x 13/16 in.)
cul
America
accession
2015.51
Source extras
tec
brass photographic locket with 12 miniature albumen prints
tombstone
Somebody's Luggage (Miniature Wedding Album of Tom Thumb and Lavinia Warren), c. 1863. Mathew Brady (American, 1823–1896). Brass photographic locket with 12 miniature albumen prints; overall: 2.7 x 2 x 1 cm (1 1/16 x 13/16 x 3/8 in.); each: 2.3 x 2 cm (7/8 x 13/16 in.). The Cleveland Museum of Art, Gift of Herbert Ascherman Jr., 2015.51
collection
PH - American 19th Century
creditline
Gift of Herbert Ascherman Jr.
updatedAt
2026-05-29 08:50:28.872000
sourceId
172558
dept
Photography
coll
PH - American 19th Century
med
brass photographic locket with 12 miniature albumen prints
creatorTags
male
thumbnail_url
image_url
Single page context
seq
1
pageIndex
0
type
photo
mediaId
03557dc4718f416a