According to documentation and shared stories, this painting was one of a set of six Dominican saints from the Baja California missions. Each portrait was done in a similar full-length style and purchased by Archbishop Sadoc Alemany. They were given to Fr. Sadoc Francis Vilarassa y Costa, in 1861, founder of the Western Dominican Province. The precise location of the other paintings is uncertain.

Louis Bertrand, known as the "apostle to the Americas," is the patron saint of novice masters as well as a patron saint of the Western Dominican Province.