[The Wilderness Battlefield]

Unknown

Not on view

There is still much to learn about the role of the camera during the Civil War. One day we may know more about some of the war’s most intriguing field photographs: the macabre studies of skulls and unburied bones discovered by an unknown photographer in the Wilderness battlefield where Generals Robert E. Lee and Ulysses S. Grant had fought to a bloody draw in May 1864. It seems likely that these photographs date from the immediate postwar period, during cleanup operations. Printed from negatives that were probably unintentionally solarized during development in the field, the photographs appear illuminated by an unearthly light and are, in part, tonally reversed: the black sky becoming an appropriate symbol for the terrible place called Wilderness, second only to Gettysburg in the number of Union killed, wounded, and missing.

[The Wilderness Battlefield], Unknown (American), Albumen silver print from glass negative

This image cannot be enlarged, viewed at full screen, or downloaded.

Open Access

As part of the Met's Open Access policy, you can freely copy, modify and distribute this image, even for commercial purposes.

API

Public domain data for this object can also be accessed using the Met's Open Access API.

2005.100.1253