With Grant’s victories at Fort Henry and Fort Donelson and his promotion to major general, the public was anxious to see what the new hero looked like and publishers of newspapers, prints, and carte-de-visites struggled to satisfy the demand. The only photograph that was even somewhat available was a photo of Grant as a newly minted brigadier general taken in Cairo, Illinois, in October 1861 that showed him, uncharacteristically, in more or less full uniform and wearing a long beard that he soon cut short at the behest of his wife. Publishers seem to have loosely and inventively adapted that portrait, removing his army dress hat and altering his uniform to fit his new rank. In that guise he appeared in a lithograph published in Cincinnati in early 1862 by Ehrgott and Forbriger, and even on the front page of Harper’s Weekly on March 8, 1862. It seems to be a version of that woodcut that was used for this engraved portrait, published and backmarked by Kane in New York City, which vignettes the longer newspaper portrait and substitutes shoulder straps for epaulets. Interestingly, the already inaccurate long beard and somewhat loose resemblance to the original, supported some assertions that in their eagerness to fill a market demand, publishers had used the image of an army beef contractor when a portrait of the general proved too difficult to find.

The card is in very good condition. On the back there are some traces of an inscription and a few pieces of blue paper stuck to the corners from being mounted on an album page. The bottom front bears a period brown ink identification as, “Gen Grant,” in case one grew tired of guessing his identity on facial resemblance alone. This is a very interesting, and entertaining, bit of Civil War history and how it was reported at the time.  [SR]

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