December 8, 2011
This lot is closed for bidding. Bidding ended on 12/8/2011
CDV Photograph Signed “R.E. Lee” at lower right edge beneath oval bust image of Lee in uniform. Backmarked, “The ‘Lee’ Photographic Gallery, 920 Main Street, over the Richmond Musical Exchange. John W. Davies.” Both the signature and image are ever so light, still exceptional signed Lee photograph. Known as the “floppy tie” portrait, it was taken in 1864 by John W. Davies in the Lee Gallery operated by J.W. and W.W. Davies, in Richmond. Edward D.C. Campbell, Jr., in his article “The Fabric of Command: R.E. Lee, Confederate Insignia, and the Perception of Rank” published in “The Virginia Magazine of History and Biography” (Vol. 98 No. 2, April 1990), wrote that Davies “made a single image. The picture was, in fact, a favorite of both General Lee and is easily recognized by Lee’s closely cropped beard, ill-fitting collar, and drooping black tie.” An albumen silver print of this image is in the National Portrait Gallery of the Smithsonian Institution and is on the cover of “Faces of Discord: The Civil War Era at the National Portrait Gallery,” edited by James G. Barber (New York: HarperCollins, 2006).
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