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Born Deborah Lyde, Mrs. Francis Brinley (1698–1761) was the daughter of Edward and Catherine Lyde and the granddaughter of Judge Nathaniel Byfield. A young woman of wealth and social prominence, she doubled her stature and affluence when she married Francis Brinley in 1718. The Brinleys were among the first colonists to sit for the Scottish-born Smibert, who had recently arrived in New England from London. An entry dated May 1729 in Smibert's notebook records that the Brinleys had commissioned two portraits from the artist and identifies the infant as their son Francis (1729–1816).

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Mrs. Francis Brinley and Her Son Francis, 1729
John Smibert (1688–1751)
Oil on canvas; 50 x 39 1/4 in. (127.0 x 99.7 cm)
Rogers Fund, 1962 (62.79.2)

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