1880-1890 circa

Volck, Adalbert John, 1828-1912

Header Record

Title: Confederate war etchings [Decimalized .01-.29]

This portfolio is a reprint of the original 1863 publication. The twenty-nine etchings by Volck were originally published under the name "V. Blada." Made during the Civil War, the etchings show sympathy for the Confederate cause, and distaste for warfare in general. It sardonically illustrates events that allegedly took place in the North and South from New York and Baltimore to Charleston and Vicksburg between 1861 and 1863. Lincoln's ideals and actions are caricatured, as are such topics as Union army conscription methods, Northern treatment of African Americans, and the behavior of the…

GLC00493

circa 1880-1890

Volck, Adalbert John, 1828-1912

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Title: Lincoln writing the Emancipation Proclamation

Depicts a menacing-looking Lincoln slumping in his chair writing the Emancipation Proclamation with his left foot sitting on top of a copy of the U.S. Constitution. Demon imagery is found throughout. The Statue of Liberty's head is covered by Lincoln's Scotch cap to simulate a baboon. Background has two paintings. One depicts the slave rebellion on Saint Domingo and the other John Brown as "St. Ossawotamie." Osawotamie is a reference to a battle at the town of Osawatomie, Kansas in August 1856 when some 250 border ruffians attacked the free-soil town. Brown defended the town with 30 men, but…

GLC00493.03

circa 1880-1890

Volck, Adalbert John, 1828-1912

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Title: Passage through Baltimore

Comments on Abraham Lincoln's stealthy trip through pro-South Baltimore on his way to Washington to be inaugurated. Lincoln's plans were changed in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania on 22 February 1861 to avoid trouble in Baltimore. He boarded a special train on 23 February 1861 and travelled through Baltimore behind the curtains of a berth in a sleeping car. Volck depicts Lincoln being frightened by a hissing cat as he attempts to peek out of a freight car. The letters "P.W. & B.R.R. Co" (Philadelphia Wilmington & Baltimore Railroad) are on the freight car as well as the words "fright Bones…

GLC00493.02

circa 1880-1890

Volck, Adalbert John, 1828-1912

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Title: The Battle in Baltimore April 19th 1861

What Volck calls a "battle" has been more often been described as the Baltimore Riot. Shows the 6th Massachusetts Regiment travelling through Baltimore to Washington, answering Lincoln's call for 75,000 volunteers for ninety days' service to defend the capitol. The troops had to switch train stations in Baltimore and a riot broke out on route to the transfer station. Image depicts the riot taking place at train tracks between Union soldiers and secessionist sympathizers. Shows civilians throwing stones and brandishing pistols. Also portrays Union soldiers, some on the train, using rifles with…

GLC00493.04

circa 1880-1890

Volck, Adalbert John, 1828-1912

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Title: Marylanders crossing the Potomac to join the Southern Army

Depicts four Marylanders rowing south across the Potomac River into Virginia to join the army of Robert E. Lee. One man is standing in the boat in an echo of George Washington in Emanuel Gottlieb Leutze's famous painting "George Washington Crossing the Delaware." The Potomac is also associated with Washington, which gives these men further patriotic virtue. The men have supplies on the boat and are staring off in the distance at what appears to be a camp. Size in extent is for the mount. The actual size of the etching is 20.4 x 26.6 cm. Title in pencil on verso.

GLC00493.08

circa 1880-1890

Volck, Adalbert John, 1828-1912

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Title: Election in Baltimore, November, 1862

Depicts Federal troops overseeing the election. They are intimidating the respectable citizens attempting to vote while encouraging those of less reputable character. Unruly Unionist members of the crowd, at least some of whom appear to be African American, wave banners that say, "Union or Nothing," and "Hail Columbia-Happy Land!!!" The George Washington monument in Baltimore's Mount Vernon Place is seen in the background. Size in extent is for the mount. The actual size of the etching is 20 x 26.6 cm. Title in pencil on verso.

GLC00493.09

circa 1880-1890

Volck, Adalbert John, 1828-1912

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Title: Worship of the North

Depicts Lincoln in front of an altar with a black idol sitting on a platform with the words "Chicago Platform" on it. A sheet hanging from the platform says "The end justifies the means." Shows a white person being sacrificed in front of it. Henry Ward Beecher is shown having just used the sacrificial knife, Charles Sumner bearing a torch, Horace Greeley swinging a censer that emits snakes, and General Benjamin Butler (Volck had a special enmity for Butler after he occupied Baltimore, Volck's hometown, in early 1861) kneeling in worship with a knapsack full of stolen money. Also shows General…

GLC00493.01

circa 1880-1890

Volck, Adalbert John, 1828-1912

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Title: Searching for arms

Depicts arrogant Northern soldiers rummaging for weapons through the house of a Southern sympathizer. A woman is holding her scared daughter in the right foreground. The two women are in nightgowns and have wrapped themselves in a curtain to cover themselves from the view of the soldiers. The left foreground shows two soldiers looking under a mattress for weapons while another soldier shows the women a small Confederate flag he found in the house, as if to say this was all the proof he needed of their disloyalty. Background shows the man of the house fighting with two soldiers. Size in…

GLC00493.05

circa 1880-1890

Volck, Adalbert John, 1828-1912

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Title: Enlistment of Sickles Brigade

Shows the duplicitous agents of Daniel Sickles recruiting the brigade he raised and equipped himself at considerable expense. A throng of bedraggled men congregate around a Federal officer who holds out a medal and wears a "Colonel Sickle's Brigade" sign on his hat. Even the dog listens intently to his rousing words. A sign reads, "The Capital in danger. Sickles Brigade to the Rescue!!!" The brigade was raised during the summer of 1861 and joined the Union Army as the Sickles or Excelsior Brigade in December 1861. Volck depicts the recruitment taking place amongst the rag-tag immigrant…

GLC00493.06

circa 1880-1890

Volck, Adalbert John, 1828-1912

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Title: Buying a substitute in the North during the war

Image comments negatively upon the Northern policy of allowing men to find a substitute to take their place in the draft. Shows a well-dressed and dandified agent with a holstered pistol showing a timid gentleman into a low class pub where the shyster agent is displaying the men the gentleman can buy as a substitute. The door has a sign pasted to it that says "Substitutes for sale supply of ablebodied men always on hand." Volck satirizes the claim that these are "ablebodied men," by depicting lower-class drunks and card players in a pub. Two blacks also appear to among the choices the…

GLC00493.07

circa 1880-1890

Volck, Adalbert John, 1828-1912

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Title: Stone Blockade off Charleston, S.C.

Depicts the treacherous route into Charleston Harbor with several sunken ships. Size in extent is for the mount. The actual size of the etching is 20.5 x 26.6 cm. Title in pencil on verso.

GLC00493.10

circa 1880-1890

Volck, Adalbert John, 1828-1912

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Title: Making clothes for the boys in the army

Depicts three women sitting in a crowded bedchamber, engaged in the entire process of making clothing. On the far left, a woman wearing a bonnet spins the raw material into thread. The thread is then woven into cloth by the woman working the loom. On the right, a woman sews the finished pieces into garments for Confederate soldiers. The scene is a quiet, domestic one, designed to convey the patriotism and sacrifice considered appropriate and desirable for Southern women. Size in extent is for the mount. The actual size of the etching is 20.4 x 26.6 cm. Title in pencil on verso.

GLC00493.11

circa 1861-1863

Volck, Adalbert John, 1828-1912

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Title: Slaves Concealing Their Master From a Search Party

One etching entitled, "Slaves Concealing Their Master From a Search Party," by Adalbert John Volck, political cartoonist and sympathist with the Confederacy. Depicts an enslaved woman, directing mounted Federal soldiers as the enslaver hides in the shadows behind the door. The actual size of the etching is 20.1 x 26.7 cm. Title in pencil on verso.

GLC00493.12

circa 1880-1890

Volck, Adalbert John, 1828-1912

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Title: Return of a raiding party from Pennsylvania

Depicts the booty of a very successful Confederate cavalry raid. Shows soldiers driving dozens of captured cattle and pigs. A wagon train, possibly full of pilfered goods, snakes in the background. Size in extent is for the mount. The actual size of the etching is 20.1 x 26.6 cm. Title in pencil on verso.

GLC00493.13

circa 1880-1890

Volck, Adalbert John, 1828-1912

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Title: Valiant men "Dat Fite Mit Siegel"

Depicts a house being plundered and burned while a woman kneels, begging Federal officers to spare her children from the flames. The officers appear haughty and indifferent to her pleas. The threat of sexual violation is implicit as an officer with a gun holds her by the laces of her corset, revealing a torn dress and her bare breast. In the upper left of the sketch one sees an older child holding a baby trying to escape out a second-floor window. An oddly dressed character to the right of the frame takes aim at the children, in a seemingly despicable act of wanton cruelty. Amidst this…

GLC00493.14

circa 1880-1890

Volck, Adalbert John, 1828-1912

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Title: Tracks of the armies

Depicts a Confederate soldier returning home to find his home destroyed and his wife and dog dead. All of his belongings lay scattered and ruined, while in the distance another building burns. Vultures are perched above, more symbols of death. It is significant to note that the bare breast of the dead wife is exposed in the rubble, suggesting that she may have been the victim of sexual assault as well as murder. Although Volck does not specify which army committed such atrocities against civilians in his title, it was understood by all who viewed the sketch that it was the Union army that was…

GLC00493.15

circa 1880-1890

Volck, Adalbert John, 1828-1912

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Title: Formation of guerrilla bands

Foreground depicts an angry figure trying to convince a farmer, who has had his homestead destroyed by Union forces, to take revenge by joining a guerrilla band in the background. The farmer sits with his wife and son among the ruins of what appears to be their house while other buildings smolder in the background. One of them could be the angry man's house. The men of the guerrilla band raise their fists in defiance and carry a banner that reads "No more surrenders." Size in extent is for the mount. The actual size of the etching is 20.2 x 26.5 cm. Title in pencil on verso.

GLC00493.16

circa 1880-1890

Volck, Adalbert John, 1828-1912

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Title: Jennison's Jayhawkers

Depicts a group of Union guerillas, known as Jayhawkers, attacking a Southern homestead. During the war, the Jayhawkers were the Seventh Kansas Calvary commanded by Colonel Charles R. Jennison. A man rides off with a woman on his horse amidst a scene of chaos and destruction. The Jayhawkers have attacked a homestead, shooting the men, stealing the animals, destroying the house, and burning the barn. The women trying to run away in the distance appear to be in danger of being shot, while the woman in the foreground in the clutches of the rogue on horseback looks heavenward. The bodice of her…

GLC00493.17

circa 1880-1890

Volck, Adalbert John, 1828-1912

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Title: Smuggling medicine into the South

Depicts a boat laden with medical supplies being unloaded quickly by a group of men, both civilian and military. A gentleman, perhaps a doctor, climbs down from his perch in a tree, presumably from whence he has been waiting for the shipment to arrive. An ardent Confederate sympathizer, Volck was active in smuggling medicines into the South across the Potomac River. Size in extent is for the mount. The actual size of the etching is 20.4 x 26.6 cm. Title in pencil on verso.

GLC00493.18

circa 1880-1890

Volck, Adalbert John, 1828-1912

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Title: Offering of bells to be cast into cannon

Depicts a pastor and members of his congregation presenting church bells to be used to create weapons of war. The officer who accepts the bells removes his hat in recognition of the reverence of the occasion. Enslaved people are depicted lifting bells and other materials. An enslaved man to the left of the center of the sketch, wears a long apron and has removed his hat. Among the other items that have been donated appear to be candlesticks and andirons. This is one of the few sketches to which Volck put his own initials "AJV" in the lower left corner. The intials "EBM" also appear above…

GLC00493.19

circa 1880-1890

Volck, Adalbert John, 1828-1912

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Title: Albert S. Johnston crossing the desert to join the Southern army

Depicts Albert Sidney Johnston in the right foreground, dressed in deerskin garb with a Native American guide and a ragtag group of men following behind. Like many other Confederate leaders, Johnston was serving in the United States army when war broke out in 1861. Johnston resigned his commission in April 1861 and hastened east from California, crossing the deserts of Arizona and Texas, to offer his services to the Confederacy. The allusion to crossing the desert may be Biblical in nature. Johnston was killed at the Battle of Shiloh in April 1862. Size in extent is for the mount. The actual…

GLC00493.20

circa 1880-1890

Volck, Adalbert John, 1828-1912

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Title: Gen'l Stuart's raid to the White House

Depicts Confederate cavalrymen under the command of General J.E.B. Stuart descending upon the Federal line only to find one Hezekiah Skinflint, a sutler who had provided provisions, in this case "ale and lager," to the soldiers. Many Southerners held stereotypes against the free-market North, and Volck buys into that by giving the sutler a name that means selfish and miserly. A bewildered Skinflint is being taken into custody at gunpoint, his supplies confiscated. The long line of covered wagons stretching into the distance suggests that many other supplies were taken in this raid of the…

GLC00493.21

circa 1880-1890

Volck, Adalbert John, 1828-1912

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Title: Gen'l Stuart's return from Pennsylvania

Depicts a line of cavalrymen stopping to allow their horses to rest. The officer at the left of the picture blows a bugle as his horse drinks from a stream. The other horses, some of which have their tongues sticking out, appear tired and thirsty. As the title suggests, these men are part of General J.E.B. Stuart's cavalry division which made raiding stops in Pennsylvania during its second successful ride around the Army of the Potomac in October 1862. Among the items taken from Pennsylvania residents by Stuart's men were horses and, at least according to this sketch, hats: one soldier can be…

GLC00493.22

circa 1880-1890

Volck, Adalbert John, 1828-1912

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Title: Butler's victim of Fort St. Philip

Depicts a heavily fortified prison where reputable and well-dressed citizens of New Orleans are shown at manual labor, shackled with ball and chain. The prisoners are guarded by members of the local home guard African American Zouave unit, who point to and mock them. In the distance, General Benjamin Butler escorts two ladies, most likely Unionist locals, through the compound. Federal forces under General Benjamin Butler and Admiral David Farragut captured Fort St. Philip, New Orleans in April 1862. Size in extent is for the mount. The actual size of the etching is 20.2 x 26.7 cm. Title in…

GLC00493.23

circa 1880-1890

Volck, Adalbert John, 1828-1912

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Title: Prayer in Stonewall Jackson's tent

Depicts a scene of quiet piety and great reverence in an army camp. Shows most of the men with their heads bowed in prayer, some weeping. Stonewall Jackson, a man known for his great religiosity, appears to be delivering a sermon to the men. Also shows a black man kneeling beside Jackson. Volck made a sketch of the actual event at Ball's Bluff, Virginia, which he later used to make this etching. Size in extent is for the mount. The actual size of the etching is 20.2 x 26.7 cm. Title in pencil on verso.

GLC00493.24