We’ve all heard of Matthew Brady - he was the one who ‘took’ all of those Civil War photos that give us such a good idea of what that war was like. All the generals, the privates, the artillery, the camps and even the battlefields before they began to remove the bodies. Without Brady, all of the horrors and realities of war were brought home - his work made it so real. But those photos were not really Brady’s - they were taken by the photographers that he hired, supplied and directed. He also preserved the negative plates and also bought some from other photographers so he would have an extensive collection of all aspects of the war.
Not much is known about his early life but at one point he went to Albany, NY for a cure for his eye inflammation and possibly met Samuel Morse of telegraph fame who instructed him in the newly developed science of daguerreotypes - creating a mirror image on silver-surfaced copper plates. He became quite adept at this and began taking daguerreotypes of such well-known people as Edgar Allan Poe and James Finnemore Cooper and even Presidents such as Andrew Jackson and Abraham Lincoln.
When the Civil War began, he marketed to parents the idea that they should have a photo of their young soldier: ‘You cannot tell how soon it may be too late’ was his macabre ad in the newspaper. Then he decided that he wanted to take pictures of the war itself and asked for permission from President Lincoln who finally gave it but only if Brady paid for it himself. In the end he spent over $100,000 to create some 10,000 plates.
He hired other photographers, staff, and gave them traveling darkrooms. He then organized them and assigned them to where he thought they could get the best photos. Meanwhile he stayed in Washington, collecting the photos and displaying them. At this time his eyesight had begun to deteriorate so he was not involved in the actual photography as he had been before.
He assigned two of his best photographers to take images of the first major battle of the Civil War, Bull Run which was expected by both sides to be quick and decisive. His photographers took many of their images before bodies had been removed from the the battlefields and, when they were displayed, they shocked the nation. Suddenly, the horrors and reality of war were brought home to those who had thought that the Civil War would be over quickly with little bloodshed.
His photographers continued to take their photos and in the end, created a 10,000-plate portfolio of war as it really was, the first time we had actual images of battle, rather than images painted years afterwards of heroic deaths and magnificent charges.
Brady had always expected the government to buy his images or to sell them to the New York Historical Society but, when both deals fell through, he was heavily in debt and was forced in to bankruptcy. He never regained his initial investment and died in a charity ward in New York City in 1896 after having broken both legs in a streetcar accident.
But his images and name live on and we have a marvelous photographic history of the Civil War.
‘Nearly all men can stand adversity, but if you want to test a man's character, give him power.’
Abraham Lincoln
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