I was watching the PBS show History Detectives on Blue Ridge Public Television recently and the very first story caught my attention as it involved both photography and the civil war.
One of the shows detectives, Wes Cowan, was checking into a claim that Geoffrey Feazell of Daytona Beach, Florida, had photographs secretly taken by his great-great-grandfather, Lt. Robert Smith, while a prisoner of war on Johnson's Island.
When the two meet, Mr. Feazell told Detective Cowan about how his great-great-grandfather had gotten a lens from a spy glass and using other parts proceeded to build a small camera. Then using chemicals he got from the prison camp's hospital he set up a small photo studio in the attic portion of the building he was being kept. Feazell then showed Cowan a group of four photos supposedly made by his great-great-grandfather.
Cowan found the whole thing hard to believe, building a camera and setting up a studio with darkroom in a prison camp without anyone finding out, but agreed to look into it.
First Cowan went to an expert on civil war photography and the man, using what the great-great-grandfather would have had on hand, successfully built a working camera and made a photo of Wes Cowan with it.
Next, with a list of chemicals used in developing photographs of the civil war Cowan went to an expert on medical history to see if those chemicals would be in a hospital. The answer was yes, the chemicals or a suitable substitute would have been in use in the typical hospital.
Now we know that it would have at least been possible for Feazell's great-great-grandfather to have accomplished this photographic feat.
There was one more important point left to be checked out. Was Feazell's great-great-grandfather a prisoner of war on Johnson's Island and was the people he photographed also prisoners of war.
Cowan checked the records and sure enough Feazell's great-great-grandfather and the four others he photographed were captured confederate soldiers who were kept at Johnson's Island. One of the four photographed was James G. Rose of the 61st TN. Infantry who was captured at Bulls Gap. That really perked me up because that's pretty local. The 61st being one of the last Confederate units formed in these parts.
Then it got better...
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RELATED LINKS:
- History Detectives - PBS
- Pictures of the Civil War - National Archives and Records Administration
- Selected Civil War Photographs - Library of Congress
- The Center for Civil War Photography
- Search Civil War Primary Sources - Tennessee State Library and Archives
- Care of Historic Photographs - Tennessee State Library and Archives Preservation Services
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