Artist:
N.C. Wyeth
(American, 1882 - 1945)
Faithful Troops Cheer General Lee
Medium: Oil on hardboard (Renaissance Panel)
Date: 1942
Dimensions:
28 × 25 1/2 in. (71.1 × 64.8 cm)
Courtesy U. S. Naval Academy Museum
Accession number: SUPP2000.556
Research Number: NCW: 556
InscribedLower right: N. C. WYETH (underlined); adhered to reverse of panel, Renaissance Panel label, no. 1122, dated 8/9/42; written on panel label: Faithful Troops Cheer / General Lee / # 8; written on reverse of panel: # 10; painted on reverse of panel in NCW's hand: GEN. ROBERT E. LEE / ON HIS BELOVED HORSE / "TRAVELER" / N. C. WYETH / 1942
ProvenanceJohn Morrell & Company, Ottuma, IA, to 1944; gift to the U. S. Naval Academy
Exhibition HistoryChadds Ford, PA, Brandywine River Museum, "Romance in Conflict, N. C. Wyeth's Civil War Paintings," Jan. 22-March 20, 2011
References
Catalogue of Paintings (Annapolis, MD: United States Naval Academy, 1961), no. 218, p. 13; Douglas Allen and Douglas Allen, Jr., N. C. Wyeth, The Collected Paintings, Illustrations and Murals (New York: Crown Publishers, 1972), p. 291, color illustration p. 155; American History Illustrated, (April 1985), cover illustration in color; Christine B. Podmaniczky, N. C. Wyeth, A Catalogue Raisonné of Paintings (London: Scala, 2008), C.156, p. 690
Curatorial RemarksThe Brandywine River Museum holds a lantern slide of the composition drawing (NCWS.95.1825.146) used in the transfer of the image from paper to panel; and an archival photograph of the painting annotated on the reverse in the artist's hand: X / "Lee" . The painting is precisely dated by a letter (NCW to Andrew Wyeth, Sept. 23, 1942, Wyeth Family Archives).
A paper marker was found in Wyeth's Photographic History of the Civil War, volume 10, at page 67, marking a photograph of Robert E. Lee by Mathew Brady.
A paper marker was found in Wyeth's Photographic History of the Civil War, volume 10, at page 67, marking a photograph of Robert E. Lee by Mathew Brady.
Image Source for printed Catalogue Raisonne:Transparency directly from painting
Photo Credit:Greg Staley, 1/2006