Rebel Works in front of Atlanta, Georgia, No. 1 from the album Photographic Views of Sherman's Campaign
George N. Barnard
American, 1819–1902
1864-65
This albumen silver print by George N. Barnard records Confederate earthworks and sandbagged trenches before Atlanta, made to document—for posterity and Northern viewers—the landscape and fortifications of Sherman's 1864 campaign.
Up close you see battered sandbags and a wooden embrasure in the foreground, jagged palisades and torn trees cutting across the middle distance, and two lonely houses beneath a vast, brooding sky that gives the scene an eerie, frozen stillness.
As an early example of documentary battlefield photography, Barnard’s image helped shape public understanding of modern, industrialized warfare and established photography’s role as a primary historical record.
Medium
Albumen silver print
Dimensions
10 1/16 × 14 1/8" (25.6 × 35.9 cm)
Classification
Department
Credit
Acquired by exchange with the Library of Congress
Accession
409.1969.39
Palette
Art Terms
Exhibitions
