After receiving his earliest instruction in painting from the engraver and portrait painter Nathaniel Jocelyn, Thomas Pritchard Rossiter quickly proved his facility as a portraitist. Upon departing New Haven he resided briefly in Troy, NY before settling in New York City. He began exhibiting his paintings at the National Academy of Design in 1837 and at the Apollo Association in 1839 and, in 1840, accompanied John W. Casilear, Asher B. Durand, and John F. Kensett on a journey to Europe.
After a brief stay in London, Rossiter and Kensett traveled to Paris where they enrolled in the Ecole Preparatorie des Beaus-Arts. In the autumn of 1841, however, Rossiter abandoned Paris and travelled through Switzerland to Italy. During the following five years he spent his winters in the Via Felice, Rome studying the works of the old masters and developing his talents as a historical and religious painter. His summers were spent on extended sketching trips in Italy, Germany and Switzerland. Upon returning to New York in the autumn of 1846 Rossiter opened a studio on Broadway. Although he constantly strove to develop his reputation as a historical painter, he continued to receive frequent commissions for portraits. In 1851 he married Anna Ehrick Parmly.
In 1853 Rossiter returned to Europe with his wife and, after making a tour of the continent, settled in Paris. He continued to work assiduously on his historical compositions and in 1865 received a gold medal for three of his paintings exhibited at the Exposition Universelle. The following year, after the death of his wife, he returned to New York. In 1857 he began several large historical compositions including Washington and Lafayette at Mount Vernon (Metropolitan Museum of Art) which was executed with Louis Remy Mignot. Rossiter spent the last decade of his life living in Cold Springs, NY and was actively engaged on numerous paintings up to his sudden death.
