Introduce melissa wynne, who is currently marketing Marketing Manager at the American Battlefield trust, the Nonprofit Organization dedicated to preserving americas hallowed battlegrounds and educating the public about the revolution pre war, war of 1812 and the civil war previously. And this is where most of you in this room know melissa from. She was the director of photography for history net, publisher of nine history related magazines, including americas civil war, American History and civil war times, for which she served as the primary photo researcher. Photographer and a regular writer. Melissa received, a b. A. In english from the university of wisconsin and has written for and published articles in multiple trade and commercial publications for more than two decades. She was a 2015 finalist for the jessie h. Neill award for best portfolio, and she is a member of the professional photographers association. Authors guild and center for civil war photography. When collect civil war photographs and ephemera with an emphasis on dead Letter Office images and Union General john h. Rawlins chief of staff to general ulysses s grant. So please join me in giving a warm shenandoah valley. Welcome to melissa. Will. Write. Thank you so much. I thank you, jonathan, so much for having me here and asking me to come talk to you. Im excited to be here and im absolutely honored to be here and humbled because it is a very esteemed lineup of speakers. So i thank you very much for having me speak. I am going to talk to you today about some civil war photography and the power of portrait and its impact on the soldier and the experience of war and the aftermath of war, not just the soldier, but for the families and for the nation. This portrait here is probably one of the most famous, if not the most famous, from the civil war. And it is the hammerstone children. Frank friedrich and alice amos, almost in of the 154th new york, was killed on the the gettysburg battlefield. His body was found by a local resident who found him clutching this photograph of his children. Frank frederick and alice. Another local resident, dr. John francis burns, decides to publish size the photo in an effort to help identify the soldier, and he makes copies of it. He duplicate it and distributes this image and also writes articles about it in local and and further out National Newspapers in an effort to identify the body of amos thomaston. And the rest is pretty much legendary he is identified the his wife will see the description of this image in a newspaper and help identify his body. This is a brand new use of photography. The this sort of Publicity Campaign and it will change the experience of the families aftermath of war. It exchanges, it changes the experience of it. Its homicides, war, this power of this portrait and. Its brand new because photography is really new at this time. Its in its infancy. During the civil war. On the left here, you can see e daguerreotype comes to the u. S. In 1839, and it is the dawn of comme photo. Also shown here is an amber type. These are hard images. Theyre called cased images or hard images. And these are expensive materials. Having your portrait taken at this time is a very expensive proposition and is inaccessible to most americans. The materials you see here, a daguerreotype was actually a silver plated copper plate, and an amber type is a glass plate. So the materials are expensive. And also there are not a lot of photographers at this time. Its a very brand new technology. You might have to travel a long way to have your portrait taken, but the sort of race to improve this technology is pretty frantic. And by 1854, in the mid 1850s, there are many other formats or technologies for having photos taken. And here you can see a tintype. Its not actually ten, its actually on an iron plate. And then on my my right, the right is a card to visit and its named for its resemblance to a popular visiting card. It comes over from france in 1854. It is a paper print. Its a mountain under cardstock. And ive got actually an example here. You can see that this is the size of it. Its a small playing card sized image. This is the first time or that the glass will actually be used as a negative and these can be duplicate id. So these images are mass produced and these materials are much, much less expensive than the materials of the hard cased imagery. You also now got an of people who want their photos taken. So photography and portrait photography at this time exples the use of it explodes. And alongside with that are some trends that will massively impact the experience of war for these soldiers, again, for thr families and for the nation. And im just going to talk a little bit about some of those trends. And that brings us back to amos hammerstone. Hes on the battlefield, were previously a soldier will die on the battlefield. Hes not feel alone hes not one. Hesot because photography has given him his identit so he does not die unknown and he does not die alone. And this new use o photography as well for these soldiers and for the famil the 19th century man or woman was fath mortality and the concept of mortality quite commonly. And it was hard for them to grasp. So there is a you know, infants died. The disease is uncontrollable at this time. The, you know, man or woman of the 19th century has to face mortality much more readily. Then we have to face it today. And a concept that they sort of a coping concept is the idea of the good death, which is a 19th century concept. And the good death is sort of a separate ocean for dying. And it has a set of parameters that. These individuals at the time would hope for. They would hope to die at home. They would hope to die surrounded by their loved ones. And with a clear conscience. And that was sort a way for the mortality to seem a little less daunting. Was this prepared way to die . The civil war, of course, will obliterate this idea. There is now you have thousands of soldiers dying on battlefields long, far away from their families, from their loved ones, and they at a moments notice. Theres no proper nation so photography, so these mourning practices and battlefield deaths will sort of try to adopt their own practices to enact a new aspect of the good death and photography is going to be an example of a way that they can do that as amos and hammerstone, hes not alone the battlefield. He has somehow brought a peace of the good death with him to the battlefield, and it can give him a sense of peace and also the ones he leaves behind because this idea of photography is also for memory, for the living and for a sense of permanency that these soldiers are lacking. They will not have they are faced with their mortality every day at a moments notice. In her book, the new republic of suffering, Drew Gilpin Faust explains stories have become legendary of soldiers scribbling their names on bits of paper and pinning them to their uniforms before engagements. They expected to be especially bloody. Afterr wendell holmes, whos pictured here, was shot at antietam and taken to a field he was so aaithat he would faint or die and be left nameless. He wrote on slip of paper. I am captain o. W. Holmes, 10th massachusetts son of Oliver Wendell holmes, m. D. , boston, and he pinned it to himself. He survives the war, but he kept th pce of paper for the rest of life. First, drew up and fast explains these soldiers tear and there that their identity is would be obliterated expressed with a grim and almost dispatch minute practicality, they confronted the enormity death with ingenious attempts to control at least one of its particulars. If a soldier could not save his life, he hoped, at least to preserve his name and photography. This new medium photography will also allow them to save their face and image of themselves. And so one of the trends that i have seen civil war photography in portrait photography are these images that are sent back home to their loved ones with these phrases and sentiments about, remembering, remembering the soldier when this you see, remember me . This man here has written it directly on the image itself. This is another cased image of a soldier, and he has also written this in in his image. Insidehease of his image, it says when this you see remember, remb me . Well, time sweet. Remember me until we meet while recollection dwells the remember o me his name is john astng. And inside i call him the civil war poet. Inside he actually contains a couple of poetry pieces as well. And again, you can see sort of a theme here the let this last one forget me, not forget me not. He repeats this phrase, these men are desperate to be and not forgotten. This is an or a cd thats been tinted of h. Wagner. Thats what it looks like. It says, im not expert in handwriting. Unfortunate, lee, but it looks to be wagner. And he writes in a journal that he sends home with this image. Remember me when this you see and thou art far away and other friends around thee when thinking of them think your old friendhis is another example of a who has written it with initials and dy in the case when this you see me, this example here is sort of a reverse of of the same concept this is Nancy Bennett bailey and sends a photo this photo to her husband and inside she has scribbled when this you see remember she sends this photo as well a small tintype of herself and her and their son elmer. This is asa bailey of the 31st wisconsin ad and he will carry this image with him again, carrying a piece of his family with him on the battlefield. Hes somehow erasing some of the concept of being alone on the battlefield. He carries this and on the back, even it says that asa bailey carried this picture of his wife and baby with him during the civil war actually a little of a funny segway or sideway. What are we . I went to the Pentagon National archives to look through his pension records. Isaiah bailey does survive and these pension records are full of information. As you heard, they really have to send a lot of documentation in to justify that. They need this pension and so a lot of them are really harrowing, you know, very sad depictions of the aftermath of the war is not over for these men, never over. So a lot times youll go through these pension records and theyre just heartbreaking. So eisa bailey does receive a pension and in it it says a granted according to his application for contracting a rupture in his left groin caused by throwing a cannonball over his head for and to pass the time so not really as sad or harrowing you sort get this picture of this guy like hey man look how how far do you think i can throw this . You know . But he does receive a pension. But again those pensions, as jonathan mentioned, do not cover all of the costs. And this is another trend that you will see in civil war photography, portrait photography men will use these images t help supportthselves. This is George Warnere 20th connecticut art and he injured by friendly fire on culps inthe battle of gettysburg. And he will lose both of his arms. A hartford surgeon that pa a medical visit in 1864 says this case calls for unusual sympathy. He is entirely helpless so far as that he cannot dress himself nor eat his without the aid of others. Homer buchanan and john richardson, these neighbors of warners on ten years later, will say it is unsafe for him to walk out from his home alone and. Consequently, he is always attended by young man. He is entirely from performing any act without the aid and assistance one or more persons so George Warner will have multiple of himself taken and he will sell these as sort of a souvenir. Its a Publicity Campaign to raise money to support himself. This image here, he he gains a t of notoriety from doing this. And when the regim in 1885 on ttburg battlefield, the to the 20th connecticut is on culps hill, they ask George Warner to unveil the monument and in order to do so, they a rope to his waist and he walks back words to pull this flag which is sort of pulley you know through the tree and it comes and unveils the monument. You can see in this portrait or this photomonunt dedication you can see string and the flag hanging from the tree. So this fim, whether im sure he receives a pension. But to help support himself and his family and there are multiple examples of this as well. This is Benjamin Franklin work, who also understood that the power of name was welcome as a good for publicity as well. So Benjamin Franklin work enlisted in the company f of the 13th iowa volunteer infantry. He ends up by the end of the in the second minnesota cavalry and he stays on past the war and he spent the most of the remainder of the war. And after on patrols in minnesota and sells dakota in december of 65, the stagecoach he was traveling in was overturned in a blizzard and he nearly froze. This doctor was forced to amputate all four of his limbs. So he has no means to support himself. And in an effort to make a living this, he gets several portraits of himself taken that are multiple poses. And he has his story on the back and he will sell these. He kind of coins himself as the soldier and he will sell these images as a means of making a living. Hes rather successful at it as well. Heells thousands them. This is another example this is bernard toby. Toby. On january 1865, a powder magazine exploded while he was inside the surrendered fort fisher. 200 men were killed or wounded in this accident. And toby lost of his arms, unable work due to his injury, he purchased a hand organ and he used it to perform concerts, going around towns with son. And so he had a sort of a traveling act as a way to earn money. But his other means of supporting himself to have these portraits taken of his son and himself with the hand and had the picked the story printed on the back of this card stock and sells these images as a to support himself in the aftermath of war. Toby also becomes rather famous and gained a lot of notoriety, and he even ends up performing for president Andrew Johnson and ulysses s grant. Another form of charity or Charitable Organization that uses portrait photography in. A new and i think absolutely fascinating way is this partner ship between the freedmans association and the department of the gulf and they will eat venture to take 22 portraits of what you see are formerly enslaved individuals from new orleans. They are taken up to new york, philadelphia and they will have portraits taken for for selling the in an effort to raise money to educate these formerly enslaved. This is a group shot of the individuals that are chosen for this campaign. And you can see that they are chosen very purposefully. This Group Includes young slaves, older. They have dark complexions, fair complexions. Some of these children, they they look caucasian and are purposefully chosen to look like they can be assimilated into society. Of course, their mother would have been enslaved person and father of the enslaver this Group Portrait and some of the there are 22 poses of portraits. This campaign, this Group Portrait. Will there be rendering of it . And a story will run in harpers weekly in 1864 and will include this Group Portrait and multiple of the portraits. You can see in the portraits. I think theyre facets. Theyre draped in the flag they are using props and messaging on these images imply that the subjects shared their viewers values and the again, the goal to convince people to send money to this fundraising effort to educate slaves. You can see here again, theyre using the flag to draw draped in it. This one shows the slaves being educated and says learning is wealth. You get this real sense of, you know, this idea that if they can be educated through the use this fundraising technique, they can be integrated into society. This one is actually my favorite. This is the first one of this series that i had ever found or owned. And this is rebecca sugar. And again you see, shes shes adoringly looking at the flag. Oh, how i love the old flag. Theyre using these props, you know, really to draw on this patriotic sentiment. The time in the weekly article, it describes rebecca huger as 11 years old. She was a slave in her fathers house, the special attendant of a girl a little older than herself to all appearance, she is perfectly white, her complexion hair and features show not the slightest trace of blood in the few months during which she has been at school, she has learned to read well and writes as neatly as most children of her age. Her mother and grandmother live in new orleans, where they support themselves by their own. Again, this is in the article in the harpers weekly. There. You know, these people can be assimilated society if we pay to educate them. And i think really whats interesting about that is this is not just an individuals experience of war. It really shows how the portrait of the power of these portraits can shape the nations impact of war. How nation responds to the as well. So im going to talk a little bit about of my favorite subjects to talk about, and that is the dead Letter Office images. This is the nation coming to grips with the aftermath of the civil war and again, the power of portraits to sort of enact this response. These are these are called dead Letter Office images. And i will explain a little bit about that. So the dead office is established in 1825, and its located in washington, d. C. It, was designated to investigate under mail a its intent was to get this mail to its intended recipients dead letter. Office clerks were exclusively granted by congress the ability to open the mail and examine its contents for clues as to its proposed destination. The clerks were typically women or retired clergy men. Basically, they were believed to possess a higher moral or standard and thats why they were allowed to open the mail. These clerks really had to use lot of sleuthing to try to understand where these letters would be going to they had to have a queen of the colloquial use of language and also obviously names and places. So it was a sleuthing aspect of this, you know, effort here. During the civil war, there are two phenomenon of the civil war that greatly increased the number of letters coming to the dead Letter Office. One, hundreds of thousands of men, of course, are off at war. And you can imagine that many of them are uneducated. They have probably never written a letter before in their lives and they are the addresses may be illegible. They may be hard to understand or theyre just not written properly at all. Another aspect books. Do i go past it . Yes. Another aspect of the war that greatly impacts the amount mail coming through the dead Letter Office is postage. So before 1856 letters could be sent postage due and the cost of mail delivery would be collected from the recipient. In 1856, a law was passed that required the prepayment of all mail with postage stamps, and those letters were without proper postage would be considered held for postage. The sender, if identifiable, would notified that they had a letter and that thpostage was due, but if it was left unpaid after a brief period of te, the letter would be sent on to the dead Letter Office on may 1st of 1861, a new post Office Regulation eliminates this notification to addresses. There is a letter waiting for them and that there is postage due. So now every letter without postage on it is sent directly to the dead Letter Office. In his annual report, 1861, postmaster general Montgomery Blair wrote by immediately sending this class of letters to the dead Letter Office, it was expected that improper compliance with the law would be enforced. But so from this being the case, the number after one years trial exceeds 10,000 each month, and the attention they require imposes considerable additional labor and expense on this department. So in 1862, a third assistant postmaster general, alexander zavala, seeks to curtail this situation by creating soldiers letter stamp, which you can see in the upper left this be something that the somebody in camp would have. They would stamp soldiers letter or mail to go home. But of course, you can imagine that there are still thousands, thousands of these letters that dont receive the soldiers letter stamp. And the the dead Letter Office is inundated with mail in closed with many of these letters are portraits soldiers portraits are sending portraits home to their and by the end of the convoy list, theres about 5000 whats i think really interesting is that dead letter whips went too far dead Letter Office after a period of time. The regular mail. If they were unable to identify, who was the recipient or if it had some sort of interesting oddity, containment, eventually those letters would be destroyed. But they could only of course hold to so much mail for so long and eventually the dead Letter Office clerks would be, you know, after a time period, forced to destroy mail or the contents of it. This is not the case with these portraits. These portraits, as you can imagine, are extremely emotional this for these these clerks. And what i think is really neat is what happens next is like an unbelievable nation that comes to try to return these portraits to their intended recipients recipients by the end of the confli. Again, there are about. ve even seen numbers up to 10,000. T i think its to five 5000 of these dead Letter Office photos at the dead Letter Office. So theoffice will go through these efforts to try to return them again heavily. The third assistant postmaster alexander lee, he them displayed at the dead Letter Office museum. The dead Letter Office museum the dead letter and some of the oddest or most interesting loops its got a mind of its own to go too far. Yes. Okay im not even touching it. So. The the postmaster will sort of come up with this idea to theres thousands of these images there. And and he wants somehow to get more eyes these images so that you, again, sort of a Publicity Campaign with these with these images to try to get more people to look at them, see them, identify them and return them home to their intended recipient. So he will order them posted on these boards to the Letter Office museum, the dead law Office Museum, again, is a its an offshoot of the dead Letter Office. And a lot the oddest or most interesting that are found in dead Letter Office, you know, letters, packages that end up at the dead Letter Office are displayed. This Museum Actually has kind of a following in d. C. At this time. Its no longer there, but at the time it has a gun it has skull. I mean, people sending some very interesting things through the mail at the time. So they decided to do something with that and turn it into a museum. So he wants to capitalize on this idea of visitors to the museum. And he will do that. So he will them posted to panels 36 on a panel. Each board had 36 images and they are four rows of nine each. And you can see they are each posted on the panels with brass clips on the top and the bottom and they eh will have a red numeral on the bottom. So the red numeral is an identification numbe number. When a familiar face people would come in and see on the board. Caimagine walking into a room with 5000 of these men staring you and thats thats the army right there looking at you. And i think. It is the power of these portraits makes it impossible. These dead Letter Office clerks and the postmaster and the everybody involved in this effort to to just destroy these images. They want get them to their intended recipients. I call these on these interrupted sentiments. Theyre interrupted. They are meant to be somewhere and they have not there yet. And the dead Letter Office goes through all these efforts, get them to their recipients. That when familiar face, would present itself, people would come to the museum, they would see somebody up there and say, you know number four, three, one. I know who that is, you know, ill take him. You have to sort of prove that hes yours. And they take it off the board and write it. Who claimed the the photograph. Who the photograph is. So hes now identified and they will let you take the, the photo home. At that time they still had the letters attached to them. But at some point through this process, the letters are no longer attached to the photos and there are Success Stories. So on june 17th of 1874, now were talking ten years after the war, june 17th, 1874, mr. F poplin claimed the photo of lieutenant s roderick of the 19th iowa infantry. According to one of these panels that still exists on october 16th, 1902, edward marsh of the 10th new york battery claims a photo of himself 40 years after he placed in the mail. Its impossible now to say, you know how many of these were claimed because some of these boards have been lost or just disassembled. But some put the as high as 2000. The dead Letter Office also advert wise the descriptive lists of these photograph in newspapers and journals of the grand of the republic. Im going to go back so you can see them still in the early 1890s. The photograph and panels were cleaned and they were into an album. One of these panels per page. And at that time the dead Letter Office also began working with veterans groups to track down the descendants of of the photographs that might have any identifying information on it. At one point, the armys mid post in philadelphia inspects every photograph and removes all those with inscriptions and turns them over to the r headquarters in dc for further help. Identify find them and delivering them to the rightful owners. These are extraordinary efforts to reunite, reunite the soldier with the recipients. I talked to somebody at the post Office Museum today. She was floored by these efforts and said they went above and beyond the standard operating procedure. I think it shows how deep the scars of the war were for the United States and that people were dealing with the aftermath very personally, personally, in a very tangible way these last for decades, as ive once theyre bound these albums the post office eventually will send them out into the world theyre now going on tour and they will wlds fairs that went to the chicago world 1893. In 1898, they wee trans mississippi and International Exposition in omaha, nebraska. D again, this is an effort to get more people in the countries eyes on these portraits, to bring them home to their intended recipients. And there are Success Stories at that 1898 trans mississippi expo, the daughter of Civil War Veteran jj gorman, her fathers photograph, which had been sent during the war from indianapolis to south bend while he was serving with the 86th indiana infantry. It had been in the dead Letter Office exhibit for 35 years, a newspaper reporter who came to see this exhibit said there is a melancholy collection from the dead Letter Office, including two cases of photographs of soldiers which were sent and miscarried during the civil war. Looking at them, i thought, how young were most of the faces . So these fears offered some new Success Stories. But several decades past the war, of course, you can imagine that the Success Stories become fewer and fewer and fewer. In 1911, the dead Letter Office mu closed of the album of the dead Letter Office forrs in while, and it was still observers to come and at it. Uent but by t iwas placed in storage and in the 1940s embroil in world war two, the government decides to free up Storage Space at the post office building, and the album was divided and sold in 1948. It was a collector bought of ten of the panels from these books and donated them to t grge eastman museum, which is where they still ten of these reside there today. A number of the other panel were sold to a bookseller in new york, and then broken up into other collector collectors. Bought up some of those from other people as well. So they still sort of travel around in collections. One famous collector who owned a dead Letter Office images was named argus ogburn. And if youve ever collected or seen dead Letter Office images, he was meticulous about notating everything that he collected. He didnt just collected Letter Office images on on his imagery, everything else. He meticulously cataloged everything. So on the back of every one of his, it has his name and a catalog number number four to oh so he is sort of his own little famous call to fame or whatever in the dead Letter Office photo collector world. One of the collectors who purchased thousands of these actually from argus ogburn after he sold off his collection is taylor and he said they were lost in the mails of the 1860s and never found their rightful owners with any luck, todays owners will appreciate them as individual of Civil War History that a finally come to rest in the proper place again. You can see these images when see them in collections stores or not stores but antique sellers. You cays identify them because. They will have a red numeral on the bottom and theyll have thess where these brass clips had had been. And so theyre highly sought after. So again, i think its the power of the portrait of these soldiers faces, the power of portrait that that really enlists the entire nation here in this effort to bring these soldiers home to their intended as as long as they could into the 20th century. So from amos hammerstein this is amos hammersteins experience of war to the power of portrait to shape this war and efforts. You can see that photography willompletely alter this experience, and it greatly impact how these soldiers experice war. But so the aftermath war, what the efforts are in the aftermath of war to help themselves support themselves have means of support themselves, but also the nations efforts with this photography. To sum it up, im going to look at frederick douass very briefly, a man who definitely understood the power of portrait of the former slave abolitionist was one of the most ptographed americans of his time, and that was on purpose. Douglass belowelieved strongly in the power of portrait. He says it is evident that the great cheapness and universal of pictures must exert a powerful, thgh silent influence upon the ideas and sentiment of present and future. He believed very strongly in this power of portrait to represent a person, as a person rather than a caricature for its powerful currency. That several examples ive shown you and also to shape a nations beliefs and efforts. It offered not only to the end individual but to the nation a legacy. The portrait as a new power here impacts the war and the aftermath of it. For the soldier, the family, the home and the nation. Thank you. Ill take any questions. Should i call on people or. Oh, okay, sir. Hi. A couple of months ago i had another another museum. They claimed that world war one was the first great use for soldiers photography because at that time that was first Time Photography was according to what they maintained, could go into the field and actually take pictures with a backdrop in the field. What would be your thoughts, given your detailed work in civil war photography and how commonplace that had become with carter objects . Absolutely. I do think theres a the technology of cameras and photography has greatly improved by world war one when youre looking at any type of civil war photo youre talking about plates and these cameras you pinpoint you know pinhole photography, your exposures are long. You cannot capture action shots at all. Thats not a thing. What portrait . Photography at the time a lot of people will sort of joke that looks really miserable because theyre not smiling. Many of these exposures would be minutes long. It would be hard to hold a smile or sort of facial expression in for any length of time. So they were told to hold still and just look at the camera. So there is no way for photogs offers to go into the field or go into the battlefield and and capture any sort of real sense of the action, the battle of war. So for for definitely im sure the four world war one that use of photography would be probably the birth of that use of combat photography. There are examples of photographers who traveled to civil war battlefields. But there are, of course, always in the aftermath and what they are capturing at the battlefield are landscapes of important places and dead bodies that, however, is one of the first uses of photography one of the first experiences of burying in the war. Home to the the the regular public, the regular citizenry. Matthew brady, of course, famously takes some photographs and displays them outside of his studio in new york, and they have dead soldiers, dead images of dead soldiers. This is the first time that america is actually going to see how its not glamorous. War is not glamorous. It is you know, these soldiers are dying alone. They are unnamed. They are their bodies on field. And its sort of breaks this patriotic idea, this, you know, sentimental. You know, lets go fight the war or fight the war for the union. Yes, of course. That is still obviously a huge theme throughout the war. But photography will bring some of the reality of war home for the First Time Ever to the american public. Yes. I just loved your presentation of new information was all kind of unknown to at least me and many of the people here. Great. But my question to you is about one specific photo that you had there of in logansport, indiana you had something in the bottom. You may not have paid attention to this, but it said to operating rooms is an operator room. At that time it was in it in the photo, it said two operating rooms. Okay, im going to go back. And it was logans and what is an operating room is a photography studio or is that is that something had had a different meaning and those kind in back versus today it was logans part indiana. Thats it. Thats it. A look at it to operate at the bottom of on the right to operate probably so i it might might be a studio i couldnt help but notice that because i spent much of my time in operating rooms but i didnt take pictures like that. I can tell you that. That is probably true and a lot of times these back marks are fascinating in themselves. I could really go civil war nerd, but the the back marks will have information like that on them. I love how theyll just put directly on some of them. I dont know what this one exactly says, but it says like across the street from the bank, you know it itll have little instructions on how to get there or little of information like that that sort of sell to separate them from another operation in town. Because, of course, again, with the birth of this explosion of portrait photography during this time in the use of photography, going to get an explosion of the number photographers as well, really dont know because the back room. Oh, really nice. You he has a question. So i kind of had to brief questions. So kind of referencing the your favorite photo, the one i believe it a farmer like an emancipated yes slave daughter. Rebecca. Yes. Im so my first question is in your findings, what extent would you attribute civil war photography maybe for the use of propaganda during that time, out of curiosity and to with our modern like selfie generation and the explosion of smart devices, do you think the emotion or gravity of photography has been cheapened over the extent of time compared to how it was in the civil war . Absolutely. I would absolutely call this a Propaganda Campaign really. And i do think, again, even you know, that, of course, propaganda existed well before this in drawings and cartoon and caricatures and words. But absolutely, the use of photography. Will you know enhance that ability greatly. I dont know exactly what the direct impact on it on the civil wars use of it in that effort will be. But i, i mean if you got the entire nation warring itself, im sure theres lots of opportunities for new ways use photography or any sort of imagery or words honestly to look at the of Publicity Campaign. The idea of Propaganda Campaign. And i definitely think that this will, you know, further the use of use of photography in those ways in terms of photography today. Wow. How much time do you have . Absolutely. I think theres, you know, its hard to say. I have teenagers and, you know, do they have the same appreciate for photography that we do know . You know, its very immediate for them. And, you know, but i absolutely think there are some interesting trends that there are thousands of trends that will come out. Our photography now with the idea of the selfie or the idea of carrying it in your pocket. Ill tell you a funny story i bought my children. Ive got three some these plastic cameras, film cameras, they take medium format film and i have the i can develop the film myself and i love film and im like, oh, im going to instill this in them. This is about ten years ago. So little at this point. And, you know, they the take the picture and you know, one picture and they look at the back and i was like, theres no picture. Theyre like, how do i know if i got it . You know, you dont. So is it vastly different it it its like mountains and universe is different photography today. It was but i but i do think that many of the trends that pop up during this period of time theyll continue. I mean, of course were going to use, you know, photography still as propaganda publicity and you know, does do people have people dont actually have that sort of, you know, of non permanency anymore that im talking about with some of these soldiers. So, i mean, there are lots of soldiers youve never seen a picture of them people. I mean, there are so many people, members of families that youve never seen a photograph of. You know, thats not necessarily going to be the case for a future generations, which is a fascinating study in itself. And then remy has. A thank this doesnt have to do with portrait, but could you talk a little bit about the use of photography as far as mapmaking because in the civil war it had a huge impact as a as it facilitated distribution of maps to civil war officers. I know sherman had a whole swag and load of mapmaking that accompanied him that way all of his subordinate officers could be working off the same map. And i think George Thomas did same thing. And so the physical tension of making maps and duplicating them was greatly facilitated by the advances in photography. Could you talk a little bit about that . Well, i dont know that much map making at the time, but i can imagine that it would. I mean, are able to send basically harmless individuals front in for, you know, before you to capture landscapes or, you know, even just a document i mean, im sure that there are new structures are erected on landscapes that maps that they might have at the time arent accounting for. So that use of photography might way better enhance them. The knowledge that they have of the maps that they are able to use and i, i dont know much about that, but i dont doubt it. Those guys were smart. What was the general risk ception of the population about the soldiers using the photographs, you know, to enhance their their finances and then . Did that change as you know, the years passed . Oh i many of these campaigns or these men who use these photographs that way they were successful and they were able, you know, to support themselves better and make a living off of these that is another actual trend of that time period. These card devised. They are collectors items. And i think its actually very interesting that its really of the first times that people will be collecting, you know, pictures or of of general as like theyre celebrities like their baseball Trading Cards and theyll put them in their photo right next to their aunt. You know these are things that people will collect in them. So for these soldiers to tell a story with their photographs they were just another part of greater trend at the time so they were successful they werent maybe even maybe novelty thinking of it themselves as a way to do it. It was already sort of in motion you honestly one of my i think its really interesting, like grant, if you see some of the very early concepts of some of these generals, theyre a little off because people have a photograph of them. So there is a rather famous portrait of grant where he doesnt look like and, but theyre calling him grant because. Thats what the illustrator thinks grant looks like. Theres another one of i think its Braxton Bragg that is its just a little not him and its because nobody really seen him yet and till they get their portraits taken and those are circulated out into into the, you know general populace now people know who you now people and and you can bet there are plenty of those generals who are going to use that photography themselves to capitalize on the notoriety or the publicity that they bring. Home. Yes, i have a i a question about if you can go back, your first one that you had the most popular one, the guy died and get and he had. Oh, sure. Okay. The question that i have is with technology and everything that they had at the time, so the guys lying on the i think i think he just went past him, didnt you . Oh, thats him. Okay. So he died on the battlefield in gettysburg, correct. Okay. So hes lying on the battlefield with a picture in hand, which i cant imagine how it looks. I mean, it in the clarity that you have there is very good. How did they come in . Did they come and take some type of picture it to make it that clear . Because. Yes. What exactly do they do to make it . I mean, because the pictures very good here where i imagine if hes lying on the battlefield, the condition of the picture is, very poor. Yeah. So thats actually where this card to visit technology is very useful here. What he is holding on the battlefield is an amber type. And this is an example of a case, a hard image or a cased image. Usually the case would be complete. But this is what he had on the battlefield with was a picture of the hard image. I think it was an amber or type of his in this case. And hes on the battlefield clutching this. So when the doctor gets a hold, this this new technology, the card to visit, i mean, its about ten years old at the time or a little than that at the battle of gettysburg. Theyll take a picture of picture. And thats what they reprint these card to on. And those will be the images that are distributed. Again, renderings be made of them and put into newspapers. And then the description of it and it ultimately actually is the description of this image that alerts the wife of ms. Holliston that its thats probably her photo. So. Mm hmm. Yes. I dont know what time it is. One more question. Okay. Right here. This question isnt really about photog free, but your favorite photo of rebecca stevens, a parent that her father was white and he had her by a slave of his probably correct. My question concerns what was. How was a person recognized as being african or black as opposed to being white . Was it different in the south, the percentage of blood you had to have to be considered black versus in the north or didnt in the north . They even think about that. Or is that strictly a southern thing difficult . Question i know its all i, i only know a little bit about that, but i do know there were definitions and i believe it was 2 of your blood had if you had 2 of it was black blood, you were considered to black or a. Yes. Thats it. Thank you much. Thank you very much for having