2 1/8 x 3 5/8 in. CDV on cardstock mount (toning, some soiling, edge wear to mount). Seated portrait of an African American woman wearing a bonnet and patterned dress, seated against a simple studio backdrop. Penciled notation on verso identifies the subject as, "Mary Nash servant on board Steamship Neptune 1865." Verso with Gardner's studio imprint and 2-cent US Internal Revenue stamp, which appears to be initialed and dated "J.B.G. / 1866."

The USS Neptune was a steam vessel taken up from the civilian trade and converted to a gunboat. Neptune was employed on the West Indies Station from January 1864 until it was decommissioned in May 1865.