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Hollywood Cemetery, Richmond, Virginia - decorating the graves of the rebel soldiers, May 31, 1867 / drawn by W.L. Sheppard. – Historic Reproduction

Hollywood Cemetery, Richmond, Virginia - decorating the graves of the rebel soldiers, May 31, 1867 / drawn by W.L. Sheppard., 1867 — antique engraving
Hollywood Cemetery, Richmond, Virginia - decorating the graves of the rebel soldiers, May 31, 1867 / drawn by W.L. Sheppard., 1867. Antique engraving from the Richmond collection.

(Originally scanned by the Library of Congress. Each image is professionally and digitally cleaned of artifacts such as color bars and extra borders prior to printing.)

Description

A window into the past: Hollywood Cemetery, Richmond, Virginia - decorating the graves of the rebel soldiers, May 31, 1867 / drawn by W.L. Sheppard., preserved in this antique engraving. It comes from the collections of the Library of Congress, scanned from the original and carefully restored.

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Hollywood Cemetery, Richmond, Virginia - decorating the graves of the rebel soldiers, May 31, 1867 / drawn by W.L. Sheppard.

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Hollywood Cemetery, on the hills above the James River in Richmond, is the setting, and the scene shows mourners laying flowers on the graves of Confederate soldiers on May 31, 1867. Richmond's women's memorial associations organized such observances in the years after the Civil War, when the city was still under federal military control and many Confederate dead rested in the cemetery's grounds. Richmond artist William Ludwell Sheppard drew the scene, and it ran as a wood engraving in Harper's Weekly that August, carrying the ritual to a national readership. It is an early visual record of the custom that later grew into Memorial Day.

Created / published1867
Medium1 print : wood engraving.
GenrePeriodical illustrations 1860-1870.Wood engravings 1860-1870.
NotesIllus. in: Harper's weekly, v. 11, 1867 Aug. 17, p. 524.
SubjectsCemeteries--Virginia--Richmond--1860-1870.
SourceLibrary of Congress, Prints and Photographs Division
Original scan4,096 × 3,243 px · prints to 14 × 11 in at 300 dpi
ReferenceAMZ-SOTP-HPA-194590

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