Description:

Lee Robert 1807 - 1870 Robert E. Lee photograph printed from war period negative




This albumen print photograph shows a bust portrait of the three-star Confederate general facing left. The carte de visite measuring 2.125" x 3.375" is captioned "General R.E. Lee. - Confederate" and mounted on a brown stock card measuring 6.5" x 4.25". An extensive description verso indicates that this photograph comes from the John C. Taylor (Hartford, CT) "The War for the Union. - Photographic History, 1861 - 1865" series. According to Taylor, a most vocal and enterprising salesman, this print of Lee was printed about 25 years after the close of the war but by using one of 6000+ negatives "of original photographs taken during the war of the Rebellion." Taylor explains that, because there is a finite number of war period negatives, and considering the difficulty of pulling contemporary prints from old and chemically changing negatives, his price of 25 cents per card is more than justified. Scattered minor stains confined mostly to the stock; foxing almost outside of Lee's image at center of carte de visite.

Hailing from a Virginia family with a prestigious Revolutionary War record, Robert E. Lee (1807-1870) graduated second in his 1829 class at West Point. He served in the United States Corps of Engineers working on coastal fortifications throughout the 1830s and up until the Mexican War. During the 1846-47 conflict, Lee served as an aide-de-camp to General Winfield Scott. Lee returned to West Point between 1852-1855 where he served as superintendent of the military academy. Lee's reputation for military competency and strategy was so well-established by April 1861 that he was Abraham Lincoln's first choice to command the Union Army.

Instead, Lee accepted a commission in the Confederate Army, eventually commanding the Army of Northern Virginia. Lee saw action at Antietam, Fredericksburg, Chancellorsvile, and Gettysburg, often riding on his famous grey horse Traveller. On April 9, 1865, Lee surrendered his army to Union General Ulysses S. Grant at Appomattox Court House, effectively ending the war.

John C. Taylor was a Civil War veteran who served as a former commander of Post No. 50, Grand Army of the Republic. In 1907, he told author Francis Trevelyan Miller, who was compiling a book about Civil War photography, how he had amassed the collection of war period negatives: "I found the seven thousand negatives in New York stored in an old garret. Anthony, the creditor, had drawn prints from some of them and I purchased all that were in his possession. I also made a deal with him to allow me to use the prints exclusively. General Albert Ordway of the Loyal Legion became acquainted with the conditions and, with Colonel Rand of Boston, he purchased the negatives from Anthony who had a clear title through court procedure. I met these gentlemen and contracted to continue my arrangement with them for the exclusive use of the prints. I finally purchased the Brady negatives from General Ordway and Colonel Rand with the intention of bringing them before the eyes of all the old soldiers so that they might see that the lens had forever perpetuated their struggle for the Union."

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