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A Vivid View of the Army of the James and General Benjamin F. Butler’s Gut.
York, PA, 1897. Hand-colored silver bromide print, 14.75” x 19.5”, mounted on larger sheet of paperboard. CONDITION: Good, some breaks and losses to the mount, some foxing to photo and mount, small bit of text at lower left either trimmed or not included in the photograph. A fascinating folk art pictorial map blending drawn and photographic imagery with extensive text to form a richly detailed and wonderfully quirky representation of the military situation along the James River during the latter part of the Civil War. This remarkable map shows the disposition of forces along the James and Appomattox Rivers, with the Army of the James—including the largest contingent of African American soldiers of any command in the Civil War—occupying the lower three-quarters of the landscape and the Confederates the upper quarter. Stretching across a portion of the center of the map are the extensive breastworks known to the army as “General Butler’s Gut”—apparently a reference to Benjamin Butler’s stout figure—to the right of which, across the James River, is Farrar’s Island, where Butler’s famed Dutch Gap Canal was constructed with the intent of circumventing a bend in the James River heavily defended by Confederate forces. The map—a photograph of a montage drawing—is teeming with images, many of them captioned, with some relating closely to military activity, while others are more whimsical. Banner’s explanation of his work appears at the bottom edge: This is part of the Old Army of the Potomac in 1864 and in 1865 to end of the war, the other part of the Army of the Potomac occupying the Front of Petersburg. This picture shows Farrer’s Island. The Gut or Front as it was called, was a beautiful piece of work, breastworks built out of trees and sandbags on for protection. It shows Butlers Dutch Gap Canal, which proved a failure after it was finished. Many men were killed while working on it. The two Rebel Gunboats were continually floating down the James River and throwing shells into it. It was constructed to avoid passing the Howlet House Battery by our Gunboats to move up the river to Richmond. The taking of our Picket line on the night of November 17, 1864, is also shown. The Sketcher of the Picture was on Picket at the house and open field with his men, as sergeant; firing was hot for a while, but our line was not broken. It also shows how the Rebels pursued our escaped Union Prisoners with Bloodhounds, The Snake is to show that they were plentiful in some localities. Comrade Jacob Kling shook two out of a blanket from his tent one morning. There were also an abundance of different Lizzard species there. It also shows City Point and Bermuda Hundred. The large Gunboat on extreme left was as far as our gunboats could come up the Appomatox River, and as far as the Army of the James, picketed to the left. The two Rebel Gunboats were blown up in the Spring of 1865. The Boat Pontoon Bridge at Broadway landing, near Point of Rocks, were made of canvas and planks laid over them. This picture was resketched by Wm. H. Banner, late Sergeant Co. H, 200th Pa. Vols., and of 107th [?…] Vols in February 1897, and is for sale by him at 583 East King Street, York, Pa. Price $2, at York. If sent away, $3. It is sent anywhere if ordered by mail. We also have for sale Picture of the Armies in Front of Petersburg, Va. Lee surrendered April 9th, 1865, at Appomattox Court House, Va.… Two notes along Butler’s Gut read, “Union Breast works with sand bags on them to protect the Troops from Confederate bullets[.] This was called General Butler’s Gut. When we left for Petersburg Colored Troops filled these trenches.” A line of batteries is situated just behind the breastworks and is continued across the James River on Farrar Island, just behind “Genl Butler’s Dutch Gap Canal,” in which numerous figures are shown digging. A note beside the canal reads, “A certain sum of money and 30 days furlough was given to men working this canal such a dangerous place it was.” Two menacing Confederate gunboats appear in the James nearby. African Americans— both soldiers and impressed freedmen from Roanoke Island—did most of the work building the canal. Consequently, many of those killed during construction were men of color. An encampment of “Colored Troops” appears at the center of the lower edge of the map. The picket line clash with Confederates that Banner mentions in his explanation is illustrated as a battle scene in the upper left. His note there observes, “Confederates Brake this Union picket line Night of Nov. 17 1864. Col. Kauffman of the 209 Pa. Vols was taken prisoner[.] The line was soon retaken. The Sketcher of this picture was with his men as Segt. on duty at the open field.” Beyond this line, on the Confederate side, are the “Petersburg Richmond Rail Road Plainly seen from the Union lines”; the “Rebel Howlet House Battery”; an eddy on the river (“Rebel Torpedoes were placed here”), and “Confederate Forts Breastworks and Camps on the James River.” On the Union side, in addition to the various encampments of soldiers, are the buildings of the “U.S. Christian Sanitary Commission”; “the Beautiful Hospital at City Point, VA”; "Grant's Army Military Rail Road to Petersburg,” which ends at the “U.S. Ammunition Arsenal,” and “Troops Going to the Front of Petersburg.” Some of the more lively elements included here are the larger illustrations. Among the subjects pictured are two escaped Union soldiers climbing trees to escape blood hounds while three other soldiers nearby make a break for it; an oversized fisherman standing on the banks of the James River “reeling in a bass” while two apparently alarmed birds fly off amidst a river scene crowded with vessels; the aforementioned and fearfully large snake coiled along the edge of the Appomattox, and along the bank downriver, two indeterminate critters, a Union officer on horseback, and—rather incongruously—a boy reclining while reading a book; a “refugee” (i.e., contraband) couple at the edge of the woods, along with the “Officer of the Day” and two soldiers, between whom the mapmaker has inserted a photograph of himself, captioned “Wm. H. Banner, York, PA. In Feb. 1897.” Less lively is a man hanging from the gallows at the edge of the same woods. The image is captioned, “What was done with spies and guerillas.” Over this crowded theatre of war a curious purple sun rises out of the forest at upper left. Organized in April 1864 as an independent command under Ulysses S. Grant’s grand design against Richmond, the Army of the James combined the Tenth and Eighteenth Corps into a mobile force intended to advance up the James River and cut the rail lifeline of Robert E. Lee’s army while the Army of the Potomac pressed from the north. Commanded by the political general Benjamin F. Butler, the army mustered more than thirty thousand men but was soon bottled on the Bermuda Hundred peninsula by Confederates under P. G. T. Beauregard and George E. Pickett, its strategic promise largely neutralized. Reorganization followed: white regiments formed the Twenty-fourth Corps, while the United States Colored Troops—among the largest concentrations of Black soldiers in Federal service—became the Twenty-fifth. Though often checked in the field, the command gained distinction as a proving ground for new matériel—including an early version of the Gatling gun—and as one of the Union armies most willing to employ African American troops in both combat and engineering works. Nowhere was the USCT’s role more visible than at the Dutch Gap Canal. In August 1864 Butler ordered a cut across Farrar’s Island to bypass Confederate batteries on the James, a hazardous enterprise carried out chiefly by the Twenty-fifth Corps. Working knee-deep in mud under sniper and artillery fire, thousands of Black soldiers excavated the trench through winter, blasted the remaining bulkhead with twelve thousand pounds of powder on New Year’s Day 1865, and persisted despite cave-ins that delayed completion until April—too late to affect operations, yet a remarkable feat of endurance and labor. The same troops seized and held key river positions, fought at Wilson’s Wharf, City Point, Petersburg, and New Market Heights—where numerous men earned Medals of Honor—and, on April 3rd, 1865, were among the first Federal soldiers to enter Richmond. Following Lee’s surrender, the Army of the James served briefly as an occupation force in Virginia, its record of stalled campaigns offset by the conspicuous service and sacrifice of its African American ranks. William Henry Banner (1846 or 1847–1917) enlisted at York, Pennsylvania, on July 20th, 1862, at the age of sixteen. He served as a private in Company F of the 107th Pennsylvania Volunteer Infantry and as a sergeant in Company H of the 200th Pennsylvania Volunteer Infantry. On March 25th, 1865, he was slightly wounded in the thigh at Fort Steadman during the Siege of Petersburg. Banner’s note indicating that he resketched his map in February of 1897 perhaps suggests that he was working from a drawing or drawings he made in the field during the war. His new drawing included both photographic and printed montage elements, which he clipped and applied to his composition. The drawing was then reproduced photographically and offered for sale (along with his Picture of the Armies in Front of Petersburg, Va.), as he advertises in the text. This project appears to have met with little success. We find no evidence of another example of this map in OCLC or elsewhere. A remarkable Civil War veteran folk art map. REFERENCES: “Army of the James” at Encyclopedia of Virginia online; “USCT’s at Dutch Gap” at American Battlefield Trust online.
Item #9956
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