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The Army of the Potomac--A Sharp-Shooter on Picket Duty
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The Army of the Potomac--A Sharp-Shooter on Picket Duty

Winslow Homer, born Boston, MA 1836-died Prout's Neck, ME 1910 · 1862 · wood engraving on paper

From the collection of Smithsonian American Art Museum. Free to download, adapt and use — no permission needed.

About this work

Winslow Homer created an image of a Union sharpshooter while working as an artist-correspondent for Harper's Weekly during the Civil War. The soldier looks through the sight of a telescopic rifle as he searches for a target. Sharpshooters were called for duty when there was a lull in the action and weary soldiers from both North and South were resting. Reviled as "murderers" by both sides, sharpshooters usually were executed if captured. Years after the Civil War ended, Homer recounted his memory of peering through the scope in a company of Union sharpshooters. "I looked through one of their rifles once when they were in a peach orchard in front of Yorktown in April, 1862," he recalled. "The . . . impression struck me as being as near murder as anything I ever think of in connection with the army & I always had a horror of that branch of the service."

Smithsonian American Art Museum’s own description
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Graphic arts
Credit lineThe Army of the Potomac--A Sharp-Shooter on Picket Duty. 1862. Winslow Homer, born Boston, MA 1836-died Prout's Neck, ME 1910. Smithsonian American Art Museum, Smithsonian American Art Museum, Gift of International Business Machines Corporation. CC0.
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