Matthew Brady

Matthew Brady was one of the primary photographers active during the American Civil War.

 71st New York Infantry at Camp Douglas, 1861

  

 Abner Doubleday

[a successful Civil War general, Doubleday has been 

mistakenly credited with having invented baseball]

 

 Alpheus S. Williams

[another Union general in the Civil War]

  

 Ambrose Burnside

[a Union general with mixed success; his distinctive facial hair gave birth to the term "sideburns"]

  

Portrait of Secretary of the Treasury Salmon P. Chase, 1860–65

Civil War

 Major General Daniel Sickles and his staff following the Battle of Gettysburg, 1863

 Dutch Gap, Virginia. Picket station of Colored troops near Dutch Gap canal, 1864

 Allan Pinkerton, President Lincoln, and Maj. Gen. John McClernand, Antietam, 1862

 Officers and ladies on porch of a garrison house, Fort Monroe, Virginia, 1864

 Sherrick Farm, Antietam Battlefield, 1862

 Union soldiers waiting to advance, Chancellorsville

 White officers of 4th U.S. Colored Infantry at leisure, Fort Slocum, 1865

William Tecumseh Sherman and staff

Civil War

Here are some photos from America's Civil War.

 Alexander Gardner - Petersburg, Virginia, Dictator Mortar, October 1864

 Brandy Station, Virginia, Scouts and guides of the Army of the Potomac, 1864

 City Point, Virginia, Gen. Rufus Ingalls and group, 1865

Colonel Ambrose Burnside and Staff, 1861

[Burnside later became a general. His name is the origin of the word "sideburns".]

 Cumberland Landing, Virginia. Group of contrabands at Foller's house, 1862

 Four Federal officers, vicinity of Fair Oaks, Virginia

 Gen. S.P. Heintzelman and group, convalescent camp, near Alexandria, Virginia

Kate Chase Sprague, best known as a society hostess during the Civil War, 1860

A few Civil War pictures

 Bealeton, Virginia. Capt. Cunningham of Gen. T.F. Meagher's staff, 1863

 Gen. Napoleon Bonaparte McLaughlen and staff, Washington, DC, 1865

 Group at headquarters, Provost Marshal Department, Petersburg, Virginia, 1864

 Group of mechanics of 1st Division, 9th Army Corps, Petersburg, Virginia, 1864

 Group of officers at headquarters, Army of the Potomac, Petersburg, Virginia, 1864

William Morris Smith: Headquarters of Gen. Gershom Mott, 

vicinity of Washington, DC, 1865

Editing 19th century photos, ctd

Here's another example of editing a very old photo. It's from the Civil War, of a group of Union soldiers playing cards. Photos of that time were taken on glass plates; the first image, unedited, shows a crack in the glass plate that has caused an offset in the image. This is corrected in the second image.

My philosophy for editing old photos is "the perfect is the enemy of the good." To get an image "perfect" (whatever that may mean) would be both time-consuming and, frankly, would probably burn me out pretty quickly. So I have my personal standard of "good enough."

Petersburg, Virginia. Officers of the 114th Pennsylvania Infantry 

playing cards in front of tents. 1864