Camp near Darnstown, Maryland; General Banks's Division; Best's Battery

Date1862

MediumSalt print

DimensionsImage and sheet: 5 11/16 × 7 7/8 inches (14.45 × 20 cm)
Mount: 9 × 10 5/8 inches (22.86 × 26.99 cm)

Credit LineGift of Hallmark Cards, Inc.

Object number2005.27.195

Signednone

InscribedTitled on mount verso, bottom, in black pen: ""Camp near Darnstown Ma." - Gen. Banks' Division - / Best's Battery."

MarkingsStamp on mount verso, lower right, in black ink: "KEAN ARCHIVES, PHILA."; On mount verso, upper left corner, in pencil: "75".

On View

Not on view

Collections

Photography

Terms

DescriptionImage of tents set up in front of a row of trees; figures stand near carts in the grassy landscape.Exhibition History

Exhibition History

Developing Greatness: The Origins of American Photography, 1839-1885. The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, MO, June 9 – December 30, 2007, no. 458.

Rotation 12. The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, MO, February 22 - July 22, 2012, no cat.

Rotation 24. The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, MO, June 9 – November 12, 2017, no cat.

Gallery Label

This unusually elegant image was produced, one suspects, more for artistic reasons than for purely documentary purposes. General Nathaniel Prentiss Banks led the 5th Corps of the Army of the Potomac during the Civil War. His division was located in Darnestown, Maryland, at the time of the battle of Ball’s Bluff in October 1861. Captain Clermont L. Best was in charge of Company F, 4th Artillery unit in 1862.

Published References

Frank Moore, ed., Anecdotes, Poetry, and Incidents of the War: North and South, 1860-1865 (New York: Publication Office, 1867): 43.

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