Smarthistory – Photographing the Battle of Gettysburg: Timothy O’Sullivan’s A Harvest of Death

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O'Sullivan, A Harvest of Death

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Question 1

According to the speakers in the video, why is the image called “A Harvest of Death”?

A	Because the battle took place on farmland near Gettysburg, Pennsylvania.
B	Because the death toll from the battle was so high, making the sacrifice for the Union cause for war all the more poignant.
C	Because scavengers literally picked the pockets of the dead soldiers who lay on the field for days following the battle.
D	Because ideas about death at the time promoted the belief that angels harvested souls of the deceased after a battle.

Question 2

According to the video, why was the battle of Gettysburg such a critical turning point in the Civil War?

A	Because president Abraham Lincoln chose to speak at the dedication of the Gettysburg National Cemetery.
B	It was a decisive victory for the Union army, which had struggled to gain the upper hand in the conflict prior to Gettysburg.
C	It was the battle with the highest number of casualties in the war.
D	It occurred at the exact halfway point of the war.

Question 3

Which statement best reflects how this photograph compares with other images of victory in art?

A	It is unusual for the focus on death and loss.
B	It is similar because it shows soldiers and a battlefield.
C	It is similar in the use of atmospheric perspective and a dynamic landscape composition.
D	It is unusual because there is no singular hero depicted as responsible for the victory.

Question 4

Which scenario most accurately describes the process for creating wartime photographic images at the time of the Civil War?

A	A single photographer, with minimal equipment, captured multiple and vivid action scenes as they happened.
B	Groups of up to 3 men, with equipment that required a wagon for transport, would arrive after a battle or in camp, setting up scenes that tell a particular story about some aspect of the war.
C	Sketch artists would capture scenes while embedded with the armies and then send the sketches back to a photography studio where the scenes would be recreated with props and photographed.
D	Small groups of photographers with heavy equipment would only be able to take photographs on days with no cloud cover, meaning they had to wait sometimes a few days after a battle to make images of the scene.

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Important concepts

war photography
collodion process
The Civil War and the Battle of Gettysburg

Key points

The Union Army’s victory at the Battle of Gettysburg in early July 1863 was a turning point in the Civil War, although it brought the highest death toll of any battle in the 4-year conflict. Abraham Lincoln’s Gettysburg address at the Gettysburg National Cemetery in November of that year reinforced the incredible sacrifice of those who gave their lives to the cause of national unity.
War photography was a relatively new endeavor at the time of the U.S. Civil War. Photographers required heavy equipment and time-intensive processes like the wet collodion method to capture images, making it difficult to take action shots during battles. Instead, they staged scenes, at times moving people, equipment or other items and crafting a composition much like a planned painting or drawing in order to tell a compelling narrative.
In comparison to precedents of military victory scenes, A Harvest of Death is unusual. It focuses on the horrors of death on the battlefield rather than a decisive moment of heroism or victory during battle. Nonetheless, the photographer relies on conventions of landscape painting such as one point and atmospheric perspective, along with a dramatic, layered composition leading the eye from foreground to background, to draw in the viewer and convey a powerful, unforgettable message about this historic event.
This photograph was included in Gardner’s Photographic Sketch Book of the War (1866). Each photograph had a lengthy caption that explained what was captured in each scene.

Gardner’s Photographic Sketch Book of the War, 1866 (The Metropolitan Museum of Art)

For the “Harvest of Death” photo the caption read: “It was, indeed, a ‘harvest of death.’ . . . Such a picture conveys a useful moral: It shows the blank horror and reality of war, in opposition to its pageantry. Here are the dreadful details! Let them aid in preventing such another calamity falling upon the nation.”

Go deeper

The Gettysburg Address—setting and context, with Dr. Kimberly Kutz Elliott

The Gettysburg Address—full text and analysis, with Dr. Kimberly Kutz Elliott

See more photos from Alexander Gardner’s Photographic Sketch Book of the War at the Met

Learn more about the wet plate photography process from PBS

William A. Frassanito, Gettysburg: A Journey in Time (Scribner, 1975), and Early Photography at Gettysburg (Thomas, 1996).

D. Mark Katz, Witness to an Era: The Life and Photographs of Alexander Gardner (Rutledge Hill Press, 1999).

Richard S. Lowry, The Photographer and the President: Abraham Lincoln, Alexander Gardner, and the Images that Made a Presidency (Rizzoli, 2015).

More to think about

Which is more powerful for you, images of heroism or death in battle? Why?

Research project ideas

Explore the photographic processes of the mid-19th century, especially war photography. Why was the advent of battlefield photography so revolutionary in communicating and understanding the realities of war? Was there anything unexpected to you about how this photograph was made? What felt familiar to you, if anything? Use your responses to reflect on the differences between the production and reception of war images in the 1860s and today.
Considering change over time, explore a broader array of images that address the experience of wartime in the U.S. Compare Harvest of Death with Edward Hopper’s Nighthawks (1942) and James Rosenquist’s F-111 (1964). Note that Nighthawks was completed just after the Japanese bombing of Pearl Harbor and the implementation of periodic blackout drills in New York City as the U.S. entered World War II. F-111 was painted during the Vietnam War.

Photographing the Battle of Gettysburg: Timothy O’Sullivan’s A Harvest of Death