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BS: Civil war photo question
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Subject: BS: Civil war photo question From: frogprince Date: 15 Jun 13 - 08:46 PM Just acquired this |
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Subject: RE: BS: Civil war photo question From: Bill D Date: 15 Jun 13 - 10:17 PM It depends on whether you can authenticate it as to date & place & source. There are many, many photos of the era. That one looks almost too clear to be really old, but if it is, and you have the only copy... who knows? Do a Google search for "Civil War" cannons and see if something similar comes up. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Civil war photo question From: Rapparee Date: 16 Jun 13 - 12:07 AM Is it on paper? If so, how yellowed is the paper? Flat or rolled? How large is the paper? Glass plates could take very clear pictures, but glass negatives are also fragile. If this is a glossy print I guess it was recent, not of the CW period. This could also be a photo of CW re-enactors doing their thing. Too many questions to answer from Flickr. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Civil war photo question From: GUEST,Peter Date: 16 Jun 13 - 06:44 AM Without access to the original and looking at the haircuts and the lack of whiskers of the gunners my first guess would be a re-enactment. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Civil war photo question From: MGM·Lion Date: 16 Jun 13 - 06:48 AM Looks like a heavy cable running at diagonal bottom left. Film camera? ~M~ |
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Subject: RE: BS: Civil war photo question From: Little Hawk Date: 16 Jun 13 - 07:49 AM I'd guess it was a photo of re-enactors from the look of it, but I can't be sure. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Civil war photo question From: Lighter Date: 16 Jun 13 - 07:52 AM Irrespective of anything else, it's much, much too sharp. Civil War cameras had long exposure times, and any but the slightest movement would result in a blur. Those gunners could not be standing stock-still in those positions. That's one reason why there are no CW pictures of actual battles. Outdoor CW photos consist mostly of people standing stiffly in ranks or sitting around (occasionally on horses) doing very little. Furthermore, the clarity of detail and the evenness of the lighting is beyond the capacity of Civil War photography. Look at any collection of authentic CW photos and you'll instantly see what I mean. MY favorite "Civil War photograph," which you can probably find online, shows Union troops exhibiting the carcass of a giant pterodactyl that they seem to have brought down with their rifles. Could it be a fake? |
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Subject: RE: BS: Civil war photo question From: MGM·Lion Date: 16 Jun 13 - 08:33 AM Perish the thought, Lighter. Mind you, nobody said that photography has to be accurate... ~M~ |
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Subject: RE: BS: Civil war photo question From: GUEST,TIA Date: 16 Jun 13 - 09:25 AM Not a smudge of dirt nor any holes in their clothing. Re-enactors for sure. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Civil war photo question From: catspaw49 Date: 16 Jun 13 - 09:33 AM Re-enactmennt Spaw |
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Subject: RE: BS: Civil war photo question From: Greg F. Date: 16 Jun 13 - 10:18 AM Only one man's opinion, but I do have some experience with the arms & equipment of the time; because of the uniforms and the way the gun crews are positioned I'd be willing to state with 95% certainty that this is s photo of re-enactors. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Civil war photo question From: Bill D Date: 16 Jun 13 - 11:02 AM I dunno... he said it's in rough shape.... and that 'cable' could just be ropes.... and the soldiers are standing still, while the smoke is blurred. The line across the upper right is not rope, but crease in the photo. There are flaws in the image that look like scratches. At worst, it 'could' be a scan of a print from a reenactment a number of years ago. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Civil war photo question From: catspaw49 Date: 16 Jun 13 - 11:43 AM Uniform length of grass, pretty clean and fresh looking soldiers and their equipment bags and all look pretty nice too. And then add in what Greg mentioned regarding positions of the men...........I still say reenactors. Spaw |
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Subject: RE: BS: Civil war photo question From: Rapparee Date: 16 Jun 13 - 12:20 PM Actually, Spaw, they're not. That's not cannon smoke, but the First Southwestern Ohio Independent Flatulent Artillery Battery in action. First confirmed use of chemical gases in war, but the historians have downplayed, nay, hidden, their role in the American Civil War for a century and a half. The grass is of a uniform height because the use of The Weapon killed the tops of it clear off. This was the only unit that went to war with beans but no bullets. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Civil war photo question From: GUEST,Grishka Date: 16 Jun 13 - 12:37 PM The "scan" itself is a forgery, done on 15 Jun 13 at 19:51:42 o'clock (GMT -4 hours) using "Adobe Photoshop CS3 Windows". The "cables" are supposed to imitate dog's ears - almost convincing in the top right corner. But what appears as fluffs (which are typical for old negatives) has obviously been drawn by a computer mouse! Practise a bit more, frogprince, if you want to fool Grishka. One of the fresh looking and well-fed soldiers has a fresh haircut in today's fashion. Reenactments have the enlightening effect of showing us how much has changed since, so that we should be very careful with judgments about history. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Civil war photo question From: Ebbie Date: 16 Jun 13 - 12:51 PM Knowing nothing, I will chime in. If that were a rope supposedly lying on the ground it would not be as taut as it appears to be. My guess is that it signifies a 'roped off' area, meant to keep onlookers at bay, which seems a bit overly thoughtful of soldiers at war. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Civil war photo question From: Greg F. Date: 16 Jun 13 - 12:57 PM Actually, "re-enactments" are nothing of the kind. They do not accurately "re-create" anything whatsoever that happened 150 years ago. They are a feel-good, Disneyesque a-historical theatrical fantasy, and subversive of real history. This from someone who had several lineal G-Grandfathers & G-G-Grandfathers who participated in the conflict, and who has become very familiar over the years with first-person accounts and primary documentation of the Civil War both as an historian, and as an interested private individual. If you really want to know about the Civil War, read Gilpin's This Republic Of Suffering & then go thru the pension records of CW Veterans (National Archives) to see what they experienced and the legacy of that experience. Additionally, read any of the several available diaries of prisoners held at Andersionville and Salisbury NC. Another must read is Lt. Ambrose Bierce's (9th Indiana Infantry 1861-1865). What I Saw Of Shiloh" There's your Civil War, in spades. Best, Greg |
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Subject: RE: BS: Civil war photo question From: Ebbie Date: 16 Jun 13 - 01:10 PM Or as Bobert would say: " The Civil War- which it was not." |
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Subject: RE: BS: Civil war photo question From: frogprince Date: 16 Jun 13 - 01:21 PM The line on the lower left that has been commented on is another crease in the photo. Anyhow, it didn't take long for this bunch to bust the fraud. I'm bad; I just took this at a "re-enactment" a few days ago, and tried to mess it up a little like it hadn't been preserved well. Maybe I'll just hit it with a little blur in Photoshop. I have no intention of trying to sell it to anyone as authentic, but the next exhibit at our local art association is "Back In Time", and I want one more thing to throw in. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Civil war photo question From: GUEST,Grishka Date: 16 Jun 13 - 01:27 PM Greg, I totally agree that reading and viewing the original artifacts is prerequisite to learning about history. Still, theatrical plays, films, poems, songs, games etc. have their roles in the relationship between living persons and history; this is a necessity of human condition, distinct from the strife for scientific truth. Think of Shakespeare. Some "reenacting" experiments are in fact of value for scientific research, e.g. to test hypotheses. - On second inspection of frogprince's opus, I found that it is amateurishly pieced together from (at least) two photos, and that large areas are retouched ("shopped"), perhaps to make a TV camera disappear. Well, Mudcatters are so credulous, even the atheists ... |
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Subject: RE: BS: Civil war photo question From: Greg F. Date: 16 Jun 13 - 02:23 PM ...theatrical plays, films, poems, songs, games etc. have their roles in the relationship between living persons and history... Think of Shakespeare Conceded - but only to a degree. The Bard - in creating interesting & engaging theater - played fast and loose with fact on more than one occasion. The theater can complement the history - but only if one is conversant with the historical facts in the first instance. The plays &c. once one knows the historical facts - can help one "the relationship between living persons and history" - but the theater only, in absence of a grounding in historical fact - is in most cases pernicious. I know of no "re-enacting" experiments conducted under strict scientific conditions - in fact, by definition they CANNOT be - that are of any real value in a scientific or historical sense - but am open to proof of such. As far as the Mudcat atheists go - I rerfrain from comment. All best, G. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Civil war photo question From: GUEST,Grishka Date: 16 Jun 13 - 03:13 PM Greg, we agree in principle. However, nowadays science is sometimes forced to cooperate with showbiz and tourism, for funding. An example is Guédelon - though I cannot possibly judge its scientific value. Faked history, not always more skilfully than in the above case, is known to have caused new wars and genocides. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Civil war photo question From: Greg F. Date: 16 Jun 13 - 04:56 PM Faked history.....is known to have caused new wars and genocides. Unfortunately, spot on. And to have perpetrated & enabled racism, and bigotry, and all manner of less lethal, tho equally damaging, garbage. Hence my aversion to the Disneyfication of history. I cannot speak to Guédelon, as the website doesn't give me enough information to be able to comment intelligently. Be Well! Greg. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Civil war photo question From: Rapparee Date: 17 Jun 13 - 10:10 AM Really? I've been to American CW "re-enactment" camps where the smell of horse shit was deliberate, bloody bandages (real blood) were thrown on the ground around a bloody "operating table" made from a door covered with a sheet, the instruments bloody. Two of the "patients" were actual amputees with their stumps dressed and "bloody" (this time from stage blood). Others were "ill", laying on their blankets with (fake) vomit around them. Yes, there were "coffins" stacked up. All that was missing were the bullets and the fleas. Some "Disneyfication" is needed -- you cannot reproduce (legally) an actual battle with live ammunition, the shouting, the confusion, the wounded, the traumatic amputations, the spurting blood, the vomit, the beshat clothing, the bayonet and sword wounds, the smell. God, the smell! But you CAN do better than people in freshly cleaned uniforms marching as if on parade. Been to the battle, done that, got the disabilities. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Civil war photo question From: Greg F. Date: 17 Jun 13 - 10:31 AM Really? Yeah really. All that was missing were the bullets and the fleas. And of course also missing, as you say, "live ammunition, the shouting, the confusion, the wounded, the traumatic amputations, the spurting blood, the vomit, the beshat clothing, the bayonet and sword wounds, the smell. God, the smell!" You figure their absence permits an accurate "re-creation"? Also missing are the dead: bloated stinking, blackening corpses of men, horses and mules. And the burial parties. And the mass graves. And the cracker-box headboards with names scratched on them. You forgot the lice & typhus, chronic dysentery, smallpox, measles. Etc. And the hundreds of thousands of veterans who carried recurring chronic infections, fevers, malaria & disabilities for the rest of their lives in an era before antibiotics. "War" as family entertainment. Bring The Kids! Fun For All Ages! Like I said, Disneyfication. And dishonest. And pernicious. PS: Thank you for your service. Sincerely. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Civil war photo question From: Rapparee Date: 17 Jun 13 - 10:32 AM You cannot actually reenact this, or this, or this. That's Antietam, Gettysburg, and Cold Harbor respectively and respectfully. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Civil war photo question From: Rapparee Date: 17 Jun 13 - 10:37 AM No, Greg F. I didn't forget. And without immunizations and antibiotics it's the same now as it was then. War doesn't care how you die or who you are when you die. A general dies just as a child does, only one gets a glorious funeral and the other a quickly closed pit if anything. Remains are still being found from the Battle of the Wilderness. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Civil war photo question From: frogprince Date: 17 Jun 13 - 10:43 AM Aww. Grishka, do ya hafta be quite so mean.... : ) I know I can't begin to touch the things a lotta people can do in Photoshop; this was mostly something for fun, and I'm really not surprised that this group readily saw what it was. I used two shots; I was shooting hand held, and all my shots with full clouds of smoke were markedly blurred from flinching from the cannon blasts. The patched grass areas cover obvious audience members in modern clothes. The assorted dust and hair is just photoshopped. You have been misinterpreting a detail or two, however. After I pieced up the image, I printed it, abused it a little more, and what you see is a scan from the print. All of the lines in the upper right and lower left are real creases in the print. The dirty smears, with some scuffing to the paper, are also real damage to the print. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Civil war photo question From: Greg F. Date: 17 Jun 13 - 11:00 AM I'm familiar with those three photos, Rap, as with the whole Gardiner/Brady lexicon. They're depict real history - not play-acting. They may yet find my G-Grandfather, KIA 5 May 1864 at The Wilderness near the Brock Road as the Vermont Brigade was being cut to pieces. Or not - he was "presumed buried on the field" & the situation at the Wilderness replicated that shown in the photo of Cold Harbor you reference, with many of the dead unburied for a year or more. There may well be no "remains" to find. Best, Greg |
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Subject: RE: BS: Civil war photo question From: Bill D Date: 17 Jun 13 - 11:20 AM It just dawned on me that *I* could have beaten Grishka to the ID by viewing the photo at full resolution and right-clicking on it and choosing "properties". I knew how to do it... I just didn't think to try. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Civil war photo question From: olddude Date: 17 Jun 13 - 11:37 AM It would have to be on Tin, I don't think the paper cabinet photos came into being until after the civil war. I am pretty sure it is not original. On the tin's the photographers at the time put a label on the tins with their names and gallery. Photography was quite expensive |
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Subject: RE: BS: Civil war photo question From: olddude Date: 17 Jun 13 - 11:40 AM sorry they used paper http://www.civilwar.org/photos/3d-photography-special/photography-and-the-civil-war.html |
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Subject: RE: BS: Civil war photo question From: Ebbie Date: 17 Jun 13 - 12:03 PM Speaking of faked/recreated scenes I remember my reaction to a *real* gun blast on television. Remember a few years back when a news crew filmed the scene when a -was it Sandinista? - stopped the van and one of the crew went forward to speak with them? They ordered him to lie down and then one of the rebels?/loyalists? raised his gun and shot the newsman point blank. The body leaped. My stomach turned. I hope never to see something like that again. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Civil war photo question From: kendall Date: 17 Jun 13 - 02:50 PM I have a photo of my paternal great grandfather who served in the Civil War. He survived the war, went to Australia to hunt for opals, died in Adelaide. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Civil war photo question From: Rapparee Date: 17 Jun 13 - 03:24 PM My thrice-great Uncle Peter (born Pieter) served in both the 14th and 16th Illinois. He chased guerrillas (Quantrilla, Anderson, etc.) in Missouri, then moseyed on down to the fight at Shiloh/Pittsburgh Landing, sauntered around the land side of Vicksburg, strolled through the Battles of Atlanta and Kennesaw Mountain, and then marched to the sea with Sherman. After that he turned sort of northwest and finally made the Grand Parade after everybody stopped shooting. He never talked about it. Not one word. We only know the above from the unit records. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Civil war photo question From: Rapparee Date: 17 Jun 13 - 11:23 PM By the way, "wet plate" or "collidion process" photography using glass plates to create negatives was invented in 1851. Brady and others used it to photograph Civil War scenes, people (especially soldiers, who wanted photos for their families), and so on. The advantage was that several "positives" could be made from one glass negative. The process only started going out of fashion in fields like astronomy in the 1980s and even now has some advantages over digital cameras. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Civil war photo question From: Ebbie Date: 18 Jun 13 - 12:11 AM Not often that there is a need to correct the librarian's spelling! Might you mean 'collodion'? |
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Subject: RE: BS: Civil war photo question From: Bob Bolton Date: 18 Jun 13 - 12:39 AM G'day Rapparee, The American Civil War ... and sundry other stoushes over tge next few decades were, indeed done on wet collodion emulsions. These were poured, only moments before, onto glass plates, in a mobile darkroom ... often, in the field - especially war zones. These were raced out to the waiting ... focussed, 'stopped down', composed camera ... immediately exposed and the dark slide raced straight back into the dark room / waggon and dropped straight into the developing tray. This was essential as the emulsion lost most of its sensitivity if it dried out. (That was the only part of the process that required such rapid stages ... but many field photographer themn further endangered their lives by (needlessly) 'fixing' in a very rapid solution: sodium cyanide ( ... instead of the safer, if rather slower, sodium thiosulphate. Wet Plate photographers. on any commercial scale - certainly in such war-time conditions tended to die before their fifth decade! The three photographers mostly connected with the important Australian "Holtermann Photos", from the 1870s goldfields of New South Wales, eastern Australia ... even without the risks of warfare conditions, died at: Beaufoy Merlin at 32 years, Charles Bayliss at 38 years ... and, Bernard Otto Holtermann himself, on his 38th birthday! As a (past professional) photographer for decades ... and now a photo archivist ... still working in my 68th year ... I can say "thank God it's a much safer game today! Regard(les)s, BobB |
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Subject: RE: BS: Civil war photo question From: Rapparee Date: 18 Jun 13 - 09:35 AM Having developed films in the past, I can only say "Amen!" to that, BobB. But them were the days when men were MEN and photographers didn't use little CCD cameras. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Civil war photo question From: GUEST Date: 18 Jun 13 - 12:11 PM Here's the real thing - I must say when I first saw this there was a slight intake of breath! http://www.shorpy.com/node/15315?size=_original#caption The Shorpy website is absolutely tremendous. Warning - you could spend hours there. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Civil war photo question From: CET Date: 18 Jun 13 - 08:29 PM I couldn't spot the technical details about splicing and photoshopping but it wasn't hard to see that this was a modern photo. Greg, what was it about the position of the guns that made you spot this as a reenactment? |
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Subject: RE: BS: Civil war photo question From: catspaw49 Date: 18 Jun 13 - 09:02 PM That's neat Kendall......My great-great-grandpa went to California and tried to develop what would eventually become aerial photography. He tried building carriers to fit on large kites but met with limited success as he could not afford to buy his own kite and had to hire one he could use. Sadly he also had a drinking problem. I have a picture of grandfather outside of a tavern in Oxnard. He was hirin' a kite........................... Spaw |
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Subject: RE: BS: Civil war photo question From: Bob Bolton Date: 18 Jun 13 - 09:18 PM G'day CET, As a working photo archivist ( History, works, structures, procedures / techniques / people, training &c ... ) for electricity supply industry in Sydney (capital city of New South Wales, Australia ... ) from inception in 1905 ... and latterly for surviving photo archives of Newcastle (major city / industrial works ... some 160 kilometres north of Sydney ... I work with a lot of relatively old film and print resources. Holdings ( and 'scan sources' ... ) mostly start with large negatives on glass or sheet film ... up to "whole plate" - 8.5" x 6.5" ... down through later ... or, at least, smaller half plate, 5" X 4" plate or sheet film and on down to 'quarter plate' - around the time that roll film becomes more common ( ... and a lot less trouble!). My immediate reaction to the linked photo was the very fake appearance of DARK hair and dust faults. These could be dark in a single-stage positive image (such as a daguerrotype or tintype ... but only if the photographer was monumentally careless ... even for 19th century wartime conditions ... and allowed such rubbish to be on the sensitised material at the time of exposure! Such intrusions in a negative - positive process would have shown up as white (negative ...) flaws. Also, the (apparently 'photoshopped' ...) creases would only have been appropriate to a paper print from a negative / positive printing procedure ... glass or film negative contact printed onto photo paper ... or else a very bad copy job ... much later in the image's history. The observations of gun emplacement / clothing and drill are more the province of archivists of early military photography - or much more careful re-enactors ... not my main concern! BobB |
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Subject: RE: BS: Civil war photo question From: frogprince Date: 18 Jun 13 - 09:53 PM The cannon firing that day was really just a scheduled demonstration of the cannon, without "fighting" in progress. A few reenactors put on skirmishes with rifles throughout the day. It was the local "Art and History Festival". |
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Subject: RE: BS: Civil war photo question From: Ebbie Date: 19 Jun 13 - 01:19 AM Spaw, groan but lol. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Civil war photo question From: GUEST,Grishka Date: 19 Jun 13 - 05:25 AM Visual realism, however perfect, can never be sufficient for understanding history. It can even be grossly misleading. What Greg wrote on 16 Jun 13 - 12:57 PM. Ebbie or Spaw, would you please enlighten a poor furriner - is "hirin' a kite" a slang expression, and what does it mean? |
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Subject: RE: BS: Civil war photo question From: Greg F. Date: 19 Jun 13 - 11:01 AM Greg, what was it about the position of the guns that made you spot this as a reenactment? Hi, CET - Long story short, the artillery pieces aren't positioned in relation to each other as they would have been and the gun crews are incomplete & their members are in incorrect positions. I've a reference knocking around in my head that gives a brief description of Civil War Field Artillery Drill, but oldtimers disease is causing intereference - if I remember it, I'll post it for you. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Civil war photo question From: Bettynh Date: 19 Jun 13 - 11:14 AM "hirin' a kite" = higher than a kite (way up there) |
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Subject: RE: BS: Civil war photo question From: Ebbie Date: 19 Jun 13 - 11:42 AM "hirin' a kite" Not to mention the implication of drunker'n a skunk. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Civil war photo question From: GUEST,Grishka Date: 19 Jun 13 - 05:32 PM Thanks very much, Betty and Ebbie. At Mudcat we learn a lot of things that we didn't even know we didn't know. |
