Whipping Negroes in Illinois.

Object Details

unknown

Description

This print depicts a white man in a Union uniform, standing in a path and holding a whip as he confronts a group of five black men and one black women who are sitting and standing on a patch of grass. This illustration was used in an 1868 book, entitled Scraps from the Prison Table: At Camp Chase and Johnson's Island, by John Barbière, a Lieutenant Colonel in the Confederate Army. He was imprisoned at Johnson’s Island during the war and as he was being transported home in the fall of 1862, the author witnessed a "brawny man" of the "Puritan race" brutally beating several "Negroes who were basking in the sunshine" with a horse whip. Barbière claimed in all his years travelling in the South, he had never seen such inhumane treatment, remarking that “the slave has merely changed masters.” The ex-Confederate employed episodes such as this to challenge notions of Northern righteousness. Barbière wanted to inform his readers of his exposure to mistreatment of Confederate prisoners in Union jails, accounts of which were often overshadowed by post-war reports of the horrors of Andersonville Prison. Scraps from the Prison Table was published by W.W.H. Davis, a printer and historian from Doylestown, Pennsylvania, who had previously served as a colonel in the Union Army with the 104th Pennsylvania Volunteer Regiment. This print and Barbière’s book, along with Northern prints of Andersonville prison, reveal a selection of the atrocities committed by both sides during the war, which were also documented in in the letters and diaries of thousands of soldiers.

Location

Currently not on view

Credit Line

Harry T. Peters "America on Stone" Lithography Collection

n.d.

ca 1862-1868

ID Number

DL.60.3307

catalog number

60.3307

Object Name

Lithograph

Object Type

Lithograph

Physical Description

paper (overall material)

ink (overall material)

Measurements

image: 4 in x 6 3/4 in; 10.16 cm x 17.145 cm

place made

World

See more items in

Home and Community Life: Domestic Life

American Civil War Prints

Art

Domestic Furnishings

National Museum of American History

Subject

Blacks

Civil War

Uniforms, Military

African American

Record ID

nmah_325536

Metadata Usage (text)

CC0

GUID (Link to Original Record)

https://n2t.net/ark:/65665/ng49ca746b4-df3d-704b-e053-15f76fa0b4fa