The American Civil War (1861-1865) was the second war caught on camera, the first being the Mexican-American War. It profoundly changed the way wars were covered and viewed. The grandeur and sweetness of an aftermath of a victorious battle that was once up to a painter to portray, all of a sudden became uninterpretable, losing its subjectivity, the true terror of war could not be hidden anymore. Americans for the first time saw the vividly horrific photographs of maimed and dying fellow Americans in agony lowly withering away on a battlefield far away from their homes. Astonishment and shock, not toward the cruelty of war, as much as to the new innovated barbaric weapons of war, left Americans bewildered. Many asked themselves is this not the war that was supposed to last a couple of months or so, what has happened? Newspapers across the land published cadaverous pictures of the worst of humanity. Those scenes of pillage and shame were captured by men like George Bernard, Matthew Brady and many more, thanks to their unselfish and improvising-friendly characters we now can see the Civil War as it truly was.

In order, to better comprehend Civil War photography we have to look at the origins of photography itself. In 1827 on one sunny, warm day history was made when after eight hours of industrious work Joseph Nicéphore Niépce developed the first fixed image. However, it was Louis-Jacques-Mandé Daguerre who first simplified the process. After reducing the exposure time to less than thirty minutes, the first permanent photograph was made. This method became known as a daguerreotype, it eventually became popular and by 1850s seventy daguerreotype studios were opened in New York. Just before the start of the Civil War, a more cost efficient practical system of photographing was developed by William Henry Fox Talbot. It was the first system to use the positive-negative process thus making it possible to have more copies of the same picture. A basic camera is a combination of optics, mechanics and chemical processes. It does not need any electricity whatsoever to function. The lens is the optical part it is a piece of curved glass. Its job is to catch beams that are bouncing off an object. This is possible because light travels slower through glass than through the air. Angle at which the light is entering the lens is also important but not much was known about it at that time. A mechanical part of the camera is the camera it self, which allows light to physically interact with the lens in such a way to make a photograph. The chemical factor concerns the elements that are needed to make all this possible. All put together that is what makes photography possible. If it were not for these early pioneers of photography our concept of our history would have been a little bit different. That is why a writer is obligated to mention their ingenuity whenever he is writing a report on a subject related to their works.

Matthew B. Brady, a son of Irish immigrants was born in 1823 in Warren County, New York. He is the father of photojournalism, and he was the most prominent photographer of the Civil War because of his commitment and mastery of his job. He mastered the art when he was in his 20s and he spent his own finances to take pictures of the war. In 1844, Brady opened a private studio in New York City displaying photographs of famous Americans. He himself said "From the first, I regarded myself as under obligation to my country to preserve the faces of its historic men and mothers". At the beginning of the war in 1861, he organized his employees into groups to spread themselves apart across the country and to get to work. Brady provided carriages called darkrooms to all his parties at his own personal expense. The total expanse was about $100,000. The First Battle of Bull Run provided the first opportunity to photograph an engagement between opposing armies. Brady was very calm during a battle as we can see from Lt. J.A. Gardner’s notes:

"On June 21, 1864, Brady, the photographer, drove his light wagon out to the entrenchments. Approaching Captain Cooper, Brady politely asked if he could take a picture of the battery when just about to fire. The enemy, observing the movement of the preparations, began firing. Brady, seeing his camera was uninjured, recalled his assistant and took more pictures from a little to the rear".

Most people do not know that he recorded more than just photographs, commentaries found in his traveling journal are used by historians to study the war in more detail. For example, to illustrate the importance of his good record keeping we can point to an important occurrence in one of the battles that would have been lost if Brady did not record it. The night before a battle serene silence was all of a sudden broken when a Confederate soldier across the field began singing patriotic songs soon a second voice was heard, and a third, and a fourth soon both armies sang together in a spirit of common fellowship. Espirit de corps was so high that one is left to wonder how could they battle those same men come morning. After the war Brady went bankrupt and was forced to live off his friends’ generosity. The government bought his collection of 5, 712 plates for $25,000 not for $125,000 he was asking for. He once said that long after his death his work will be appreciated, he was right. In my opinion, Brady was ultimately a hero as much as the soldiers, who fought, history has done him wrong until recently. He died in 1896 in poverty and isolation. Nevertheless, he never really died; he lives forever as long as our memories remember him.

Another important photographer of the Civil War was Alexander Gardener, Brady’s colleague. Gardener was born in Paisley, Scotland in 1821. He became an apprentice silversmith jeweler at the age of fourteen. In his youth, Gardener found out that his interests and talents laid in photography and journalism, not jewelry. A committed Socialist Gardener published pamphlets promoting emigration to a colony called Clydesdale in the wilderness of Iowa. Gardener persuaded many of his friends and relatives to settle in this semi-socialist "Utopia". He intended to join them but, because of an epidemic in the settlement, never did. In 1856 Brady invited and paid Gardener to come to New York to work for him. When the war began Brady was made the official photographer of the Union armies. He took one of the most famous pictures, which he named “Death of a Rebel Sniper”. For a brief time, he worked in the Secret Service and eventually according to some; he became Lincoln’s favorite photographer. Gardener was known as quiet, intelligent and dour. In 1865, he was charged with photographing Lincoln’s assins. He published his classic, two volume work 'Gardener's Photographic Sketch Book of the Civil War' in 1866. Each book contained 100 hand-mounted original prints. However, it failed to sell, we do not know why but I think it is because Americans wanted to forget this terrible experience not remember it. Although he never found his utopia in the wild west, he unexpectedly found himself a new home in America. He stayed in Washington until his death but he never forgot his Scottish heritage, as he was a member of St. Andrew Cross. When asked about his work he said, "It is designed to speak for itself. As mementoes of the fearful struggle through which the country has just passed, it is confidently hoped that it will possess an enduring interest.

George N. Barnard yet another Northern photographer was born in 1819 in Coventry, Connecticut. During his childhood, he lived throughout the country including the south. In New York, he opened a studio; to this day, we do not know where he learned his skill. He married Sarah Jane Hodges in 1843, with whom he had two children, a daughter Mary Grace, and a son who died in infancy. At the outbreak of the Civil War Barnard was sent to photograph various locations in Virginia, including Harper’s Ferry, Bull Run and Yorktown, as well as in and around Washington. In December 1863 he was hired by the Topographical Branch of the Department of Engineers, Army of the Cumberland, to run the army’s photographic operations based in the Military Division of the Mississippi’s command headquarters in Nashville, work which involved photo-duplication of maps, plans and other materials, documenting sites and subjects as assigned, and taking portraits. He was sent to Atlanta after the city’s fall in the autumn of 1864, and consequently accompanied Sherman’s troops on their march to Savannah. In 1865, he traveled to locations in South Carolina to document the aftermath of operations there. Barnard is perhaps best known for the series of photographs taken to document Sherman’s Campaign, beginning in Tennessee, to Atlanta, the barbaric ‘March to the Sea’, and concluding in South Carolina. He died in 1902 in New York.

Timothy H. O’Sullivan was born in 1840 in New York City. As a teenager, he was employed by Matthew Brady. When the war began he was commissioned a First Lieutenant and over the next few years, he fought in Beaufort, Port Royal, Fort Walker and Fort Polaski. After being honorably discharged, he rejoined Brady’s team. In July of 1862, O’Sullivan followed the campaign of Gen. John Pope’s Virginia invasion. In May of 1863, he reached the pinnacle of his career when he took pictures of “The Harvest of Death”. In 1864 following Gen. Grant’s trail, he photographed the sieges of Petersburg and Fort Fischer. That brought him to the Appomattox Court House in April of 1865. He was granted a job within United States Geographical Surveys West of the One Hundredth Meridian, his job was photograph the west and attract settlers. O'Sullivan's pictures were among the first to record the prehistoric ruins, Navajo weavers, and pueblo villages of the Southwest. Returning to Washington, D.C., he spent the last years of his short life as official photographer for the U.S Geological Survey and the Treasury Department. He died at 42 in 1882.

James F. Gibson was probably the least known of the civil war photographers. He too was born in New York City. He learned the art under Brady. Gibson eventually photographed Gen. McClellan’s Peninsular Campaign, Seven Days Battle, Battle of Gaines Mill and Battle of Malvern Hill. He died in 1905.

One might ask, “How come there is not any southern photographers”. Many photographs were taken my southerns it is just that many of them were lost in history. The Photographic History of the Civil War might better explain:

“The natural disappointment in the South at the end of the war was such that photographers were forced to destroy all negatives, just as owners destroyed all the objects that might serve as souvenirs or relics of the terrible struggle, thinking for the moment at least, that they could not bear the strain of brooding over the tragedy”.

However, there was one noted rebel photographer named George S. Cook. Cook was born in 1819; he was a native of Connecticut. He first tried to make it in the mercantile business but was unsuccessful. He went to New Orleans to become a painter but that soon proved futile; thus, he started working with daguerreotypes in 1842. Cook settled in Charleston, South Carolina, to raise a family. During the Civil War, he was one of the foremost Confederate photographers and became famous by recording the gradual deterioration of Charleston and Fort Sumter. He photographed Fort Sumter ironclads action in and around Charleston. Most of Cook’s photographs were destroyed in a fire in 1864. When he moved his family to Richmond in 1880, his older son, George LaGrange Cook, took over his studio in Charleston. In addition to his active studio, Cook bought the negatives and businesses of other Richmond photographers who were retiring or moving. In doing so, he amassed the most complete collection of photographs of the city in one studio. George Cook remained an active photographer all his life. During the 1880s his younger son, Huestis, became interested in photography and eventually went into business with his father. After George's death on November 27, 1902, Huestis took over the Richmond studio.