Dolley Madison (1809-17)Autograph Letter, signedMontpelier, (Virginia), July 28, 1830. 9 7/8 x 7 7/8 in. (250 x 200 mm). Letter is written on one sheet folded in half to make four pages. Autograph letter, signed by First Lady Dolley Madison ("D.P. Madison"), to Anne Marguerite, Baroness Hyde de Neuville; address on verso. Creasing from original folds; open tear on second leaf from when first opened, wax seal intact with paper remnant still present; old stub along left edge from when once bound. Lot includes a reproduction of a painted portrait of Madison. Former First Lady Dolley Madison writes to her friend, French watercolorist and painter, Baroness Hyde de Neuville, thanking her for her kind letter, and updating her on her family and friends' affairs, "I hope you will be assured that your acquaintances in America can never forget you--for every individual of my family, and for myself I can answer, that we feel your loss, and a constant interest in your happiness and that of the Baron de Neuville." She goes on to discuss her husband's health: "Mr. Madison's health is not so robust as when you saw him, tho tolerably good at this time--permit me to offer his, with Paynes (Dolley's son from her first marriage) and my own affectionate salutations to you and the Baron de Neuville." Anne Marguerite Hyde de Neuville (1771-1849) was a French watercolorist and painter, known for her sketches of American life while she traveled along the eastern seaboard, during the early 18th-century. As a royalist, her and her husband, French ambassador to the United States Jean-Guillaume, Baron Hyde de Neuville, were forced to flee France at the outbreak of the French Revolution, living a nomadic life for many years in Europe and later America. When Napoleon Bonaparte came to power they were formally exiled, returning sporadically after his abdication.