Five dead Federal soldiers on the battlefield at Gettysburg, Pennsylvania. More casualties are scattered in the background. Title from paper caption pasted below the image. Published in Gardner's Photographic Sketch Book of the War, Volume 1, Pl. 36 (Washington: Philip & Solomons, [1866]), source of alt title. Accompanying text from Gardner's sketchbook: "A battle has been often the subject of elaborate description, but it can be described in one simple word, devilish! (ital.) and the distorted dead recall the ancient legends of men torn in pieces by the savage wantonness of fiends. Swept down without preparation, the shattered bodies fall in all conceivable positions. The rebels represented in the photograph are without shoes. Theses were always removed from the feet of the dead on account of the pressing needs of the survivors. The pockets turned inside out also show the appropriation did not cease with the coverings of the fee. Around is scattered the litter of the battlefield, accoutrements, ammunition, rags, cups, and canteens, crackers, haversacks & c., and letters that may tell the name of the owner although the majority will surely be buried unknown by strangers, and in a strange land...Such a picture conveys a useful moral: It shows the blank horror and reality of war, in opposition to its pageantry. Here are the dreadful details! Let them aid in preventing such another calamity falling upon the nation."
Gettysburg, Battle of, Gettysburg, Pa., 1863 United States--History--Civil War, 1861-1865--Casualties United States--History--Civil War, 1861-1865--Battlefields War casualties Dead Albumen photographs. (aat)
Place
Gettysburg (Pa.)
Source
John P. Nicholson Collection: Civil War Photographs. United States Civil War, Huntington Digital Library
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