Edwin Forbes and the Civil War Sketch of Sergeant Major William J. Jackson: How a Lost Drawing Was Rediscovered

Edwin Forbes and the Civil War Sketch of Sergeant Major William J. Jackson: How a Lost Drawing Was Rediscovered

Among the visual records of the American Civil War, the work of the "special artists" who traveled with the armies holds a distinctive place. These illustrators sketched what they saw in camp and on the battlefield, then sent their drawings north to be engraved and printed in the illustrated weeklies. One of the most respected of these artists was Edwin Forbes, who worked for Frank Leslie's Illustrated Newspaper. Among the hundreds of drawings he produced, a single pencil portrait of an ordinary Union soldier, Sergeant Major William J. Jackson of the 12th New York Volunteer Infantry, has become one of his most admired studies. What makes the drawing remarkable is not only its quality but its history: it remained largely unknown for decades before being rediscovered during the Second World War. This article traces the life of Edwin Forbes, the role of the special artists, and the long path that brought the Jackson sketch back into public view.

Who Was Edwin Forbes

Edwin Forbes was born in New York in 1839. According to standard biographical accounts, he trained under the painter Arthur Fitzwilliam Tait and began his career as an animal and landscape painter before the war redirected his work. In 1861, at roughly twenty-two years of age, he joined the staff of Frank Leslie's Illustrated Newspaper as an artist. The following year he was assigned to follow the Army of the Potomac, the principal Union army in the Eastern Theater, and he remained with the armies in the field through 1864.

Forbes was, in the language of the time, a "special artist," a category of illustrator that the illustrated press relied upon before photographs could be reproduced cheaply in print. He continued to work as a painter and etcher after the war, and he died in 1895. He is generally remembered today for the body of Civil War drawings he left behind, which form an unusually detailed visual record of army life.

The Role of the Special Artist in the Civil War

In the 1860s, newspapers and weeklies could not yet print photographs directly. Photography existed, and figures such as Mathew Brady documented the war with the camera, but turning a photograph into a printed page still required an engraver to translate the image by hand onto a woodblock. For scenes of action, movement, and daily life, publications depended on artists who could sketch quickly on the spot.

The special artists traveled with the armies, often enduring the same hardships as the soldiers. They drew battles, marches, camps, fortifications, and quiet moments of rest. Their pencil sketches were sent back to the publishers, where engravers carved the images into woodblocks for printing. Frank Leslie's Illustrated Newspaper and Harper's Weekly were the two leading outlets for this kind of work in the North. The drawings that survive give historians a window into scenes that the slow cameras of the period could rarely capture.

Forbes's Wartime Work and Its Reach

From the spring of 1862 through 1864, Forbes produced a large number of drawings while reporting on the war. He witnessed or sketched scenes connected to many of the major campaigns of the Eastern Theater, including the fighting around Manassas, Antietam, Chancellorsville, Gettysburg, and the operations against Petersburg. Accounts of his career note that he was among the first special artists to send back drawings of the fighting at Gettysburg.

A substantial portion of his wartime drawings, generally cited as well over one hundred, were engraved and published in Frank Leslie's during the war. Yet many of the sketches he made never appeared in print. The portrait of Sergeant Major Jackson was among those that were not engraved for the newspaper, which is part of the reason it stayed obscure for so long.

After the War: Etchings and Books

When the war ended, Forbes kept most of his original drawings. He continued to develop his art, reworking some of his wartime studies and turning others into oil paintings and etchings. In 1876 he published a celebrated series of etchings titled Life Studies of the Great Army, drawn from his Civil War material. The series was recognized at the Centennial Exhibition in Philadelphia that same year. He also produced a book drawing on his wartime experiences, generally cited under the title An Artist's Story of the Great War, published in 1890.

These projects established Forbes's reputation as one of the leading visual chroniclers of the Civil War. Even so, the Jackson sketch remained outside the work he chose to publish or exhibit, kept among his original studies rather than transformed into a printed image for the public.

The Sketch of Sergeant Major William J. Jackson

The drawing in question is a pencil study of Sergeant Major William J. Jackson of the 12th New York Volunteer Infantry. According to records associated with the work, Forbes made the sketch in early 1863. It is admired for its careful, lifelike treatment of an individual enlisted man rather than a general or a famous scene. In a war remembered largely through its commanders and its great battles, a sympathetic, detailed portrait of an ordinary soldier carries a particular kind of value.

Because the sketch was never engraved for Frank Leslie's, it did not reach the wide audience that the printed illustrations enjoyed. For more than eighty years after it was drawn, it was effectively unknown beyond the people who handled Forbes's collection.

The Collection Changes Hands

When Forbes died in 1895, his widow, Ida, kept his collection of original works. Within that collection, the Jackson drawing was catalogued as a study of an infantry soldier, identified as a sergeant major. In January 1901, Ida Forbes sold the entire collection to the financier J.P. Morgan. Accounts of the sale generally cite a price of twenty-five thousand dollars, a considerable sum at the time.

The collection did not remain in private hands indefinitely. In 1919, in the years following the First World War, Morgan's estate donated the Forbes material to the Library of Congress in Washington, where it remains. The transfer placed the drawings in a major public institution, yet the Jackson sketch still attracted little notice. It receded from public attention once more for roughly a quarter of a century.

Lincoln Kirstein and the Rediscovery

The sketch returned to view through an unlikely figure: a U.S. Army private named Lincoln Kirstein. Kirstein was no ordinary enlisted man. Born in 1907 into a prosperous family and educated at Harvard, he was deeply involved in the arts before the war. He had helped found the Harvard Society for Contemporary Art and, with the choreographer George Balanchine, the School of American Ballet in New York. He would go on to a long and influential career in the arts, including in dance.

Kirstein entered the Army in early 1943, at the age of about thirty-six. After basic training at Fort Dix in New Jersey, he was posted to Fort Belvoir in Virginia, where his duties included writing training manuals. Looking for something more engaging, he became interested in the subject of soldier art, the pictorial record of America's wars made by the people who fought in them. He began gathering and documenting such material. His interest in this broad subject led him to the Forbes collection at the Library of Congress, and through his work the portrait of William Jackson was brought back into the light.

Kirstein's wartime project on soldier art connected to wider efforts during the period to study and exhibit the art of America's conflicts. Later in the war, Kirstein became one of the so-called Monuments Men, the group of soldiers and specialists tasked with protecting and recovering cultural property in Europe.

Why the Story Matters

The journey of the Jackson sketch, from a quiet pencil study made in an army camp to a rediscovered piece in a national collection, illustrates how historical records survive, vanish, and reappear. A drawing can be created with care, change hands among artists, families, financiers, and institutions, and still wait decades for someone to recognize its value.

The story also highlights the work of the special artists more broadly. Their drawings preserved aspects of the Civil War that the photography of the period struggled to record: motion, the texture of daily camp life, and the faces of individual soldiers. Forbes's portrait of an ordinary sergeant major is a reminder that the human scale of the war is sometimes best preserved not in grand battle scenes but in a single, attentive study of one man.

What This History Teaches About Archives

The rediscovery of the Jackson sketch underscores a broader truth about archives and collections. Material can be safely held in an institution for years without being studied, because the holdings of a place like the Library of Congress are vast. It often takes a curious individual, asking the right question at the right moment, to draw a particular item back into public conversation. Kirstein's interest in soldier art was the catalyst that gave this drawing its second life.

For anyone interested in the Civil War, the history of illustration, or the way cultural heritage is preserved, the path of this single sketch offers a compact example of how the past is recovered piece by piece.

FAQ

Who was Edwin Forbes?

Edwin Forbes was an American artist born in New York in 1839. He worked as a "special artist" for Frank Leslie's Illustrated Newspaper during the American Civil War, traveling with the Army of the Potomac from 1862 to 1864. He is remembered for his detailed drawings of soldiers and battlefield scenes, and after the war he produced etchings and books based on his wartime work. He died in 1895.

What is the sketch of Sergeant Major William J. Jackson?

It is a pencil study by Edwin Forbes depicting Sergeant Major William J. Jackson of the 12th New York Volunteer Infantry, made in early 1863. It is admired as a lifelike portrait of an ordinary Union soldier. Because it was never engraved for the newspaper, it stayed largely unknown for many decades.

What was a Civil War "special artist"?

A special artist was an illustrator employed by a newspaper or weekly to travel with the armies and sketch scenes from the war. Because photographs could not yet be printed directly, publications relied on these artists, whose drawings were turned into engravings for printing. Frank Leslie's Illustrated Newspaper and Harper's Weekly were the leading Northern outlets for this work.

How did the Forbes collection reach the Library of Congress?

After Forbes died in 1895, his widow, Ida, kept his original works. In January 1901 she sold the collection to the financier J.P. Morgan, with accounts citing a price of twenty-five thousand dollars. In 1919, Morgan's estate donated the collection to the Library of Congress, where it remains.

Who was Lincoln Kirstein and how did he rediscover the sketch?

Lincoln Kirstein was a Harvard-educated arts figure, born in 1907, who helped found the School of American Ballet. He entered the U.S. Army in 1943 and, while stationed at Fort Belvoir, became interested in soldier art. His research into that subject led to the Forbes material at the Library of Congress and helped bring the Jackson sketch back into public view. He later served as one of the Monuments Men in Europe.