Woods at Lafayette's Headquarters

While a student in Howard Pyle’s summer school for illustration in Chadds Ford, Schoonover and other classmates gathered to hear Pyle’s spirited account of the Battle of Brandywine. These events, which took place at the Gilpin farm, known informally since the battle as "Lafayette’s Headquarters," inspired Schoonover’s oil painting of the land where these historic events occurred. Schoonover applied his paint in a combination of short thin strokes, dabs and broad brush marks to convey the dappled light of a forest interior.