Library of Congress acquires iconic Civil War image of master and slave headed to war

[woodsda]

Found this article at the Washington Post. Quite interesting and good for the American people.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/...390_story.html.

Enjoy!

[ScottCross]

Re: Library of Congress acquires iconic Civil War image of master and slave headed to war

What an Iconic image.

[Cumpston1862]

Re: Library of Congress acquires iconic Civil War image of master and slave headed to war

Thanks for posting.

I didn't realize this image was still in the possesion of the family. Very cool that they still had it.

On another note, after reading the linked article, I grow weary of people in this day and age trying to put their spin on what the photograph means. We will never know what Andrew And Silas Chandler's relationship truly was and how Silas felt about going with his master to war. Suffice to say it is a complicated matter that no matter how much scholarship it is given we will probably never know or understand these master/slave relationships in any large degree. These relationships were probably all over the board on love/hate and loyalty/betrayal and everything in between.

Case in point.

While doing genealogical research for a family I found a Confederate soldier in their family tree. This in itself is not unusual other than we live in Iowa. This family's gg grandfather served in the 2nd Tennennsse Cavalry (Confederate). Remarkably the man was in fact living in Iowa in 1860 but returned to Tennessee after the war started to fight for the Confederacy. After serving in the war the soldier returned to Iowa and become a "druggist" and passed away around 1886 in Indianola, Iowa. While looking for his headstone at the cemetery in Indianola I found his wife buried next to him and on the other side of his wife was HER mammy. Turns out this soldier's wife and her family were originally from Alabama themselves and relocated to Iowa sometime in the 1850s. The other thing that was interesting was that his wife's Mammy was laid to rest right next to her and her biological parents were on the other side of her husband. While interesting we can only guess what this relationship was as well.

[woodsda]

Re: Library of Congress acquires iconic Civil War image of master and slave headed to war

People feel a need to speculate, unfortunately, all the speculation done is from the modern standpoint of our beliefs, not those of the 1860's. It is impossible to know with any certainty why, how, or any other reason as to why anyone did what they did 150 years ago.

[rbruno]

Re: Library of Congress acquires iconic Civil War image of master and slave headed to war

Great points Louis. Speculation is all from the modern perspective. Could be all the reasons stated in the article but we will never know unless the family left a written history behind. And, even that would be up for interpretation, but at least it would have been a primary source. Great post and glad the photo has ended up in the LOC.

[Cumpston1862]

Re: Library of Congress acquires iconic Civil War image of master and slave headed to war

Gents-

Here is a link to the "Antiques Roadshow" episode where the Chandler Family brought this image to the program.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=07W-u7QAdr0