Group hosts expert on Civil War photography

Did you know that many of the photographs taken during the Civil War were 3D? Furthermore, did you know that Civil War photographs are still being found? With those two tidbits in mind, I headed over to the Renaissance Center in Kingsport where Bob Zeller, co-founder and president of The Center for Civil War Photography, was giving a presentation to the Tri-Cities Civil War Round Table. "We continue to discover Civil War photos all the time," Zeller said. "One of the most interesting discoveries we made recently, there was more than 60 forts in the Washington area — the largest of those forts, Fort Grunion, was across from the long bridge just a short distance from where the Pentagon is located today. Until a couple of years ago, the only representations of the largest fort in the Washington fort system were woodcut engravings." "Just a couple of years ago, I was contacted by a woman in New Jersey who said her dad collected Civil War photographs, and she had the first known photograph of the largest fort in the ring of forts around Washington," he continued as he projected the photo on the screen. "You see the tents. But even cooler, you see dozens and dozens of soldiers busy doing something." Zeller continued with more found photographs, showing scenes from the funeral procession of Abraham Lincoln before pausing at one and pointing out, "We see the Metropolitan Hotel in this picture, but also the National Hotel. What's fascinating about this is the National Hotel is where John Wilkes Booth stayed, and he left his room in the hotel to go assassinate Lincoln." Photography during the Civil War was done on glass plates, which could capture amazing details in both foreground and background. "This photo is crammed with incredible detail that we can zoom in on because of the size of the glass plate negatives," Zeller noted as he pointed at an image on the screen with a laser pointer. "We have the photographer's wagon and a gigantic Imperial camera. They actually had glass plates that size and took a few photos with this camera. There's a soldier in the photo looking at a Civil War photograph. We've actually got a smiling soldier here eating a piece of hardtack, and this fellow is also drinking a cup of coffee and having hardtack. This guy is apparently the company clown, and it looks like they are doing a mock hanging of him or getting ready to tie a noose around his neck." Zeller then switched to an enlarged version of the photo showing what was in the background. "Now we go into the depths of the photo. In the distance, we see the unfinished Washington monument and the Smithsonian castle tower. As we swing over to the left side of the photo is the National Observatory and, the coolest detail of all, the unfinished Capitol dome. This allows us to date the picture to 1861, possibly 1862." In another photograph, Zeller pointed out in the background that you could see the series of ladders going up a tree to a platform a photographer used to take a panoramic photo of a Union camp. "You can actually see the ropes where they used to lower and raise the plates because these glass plates had to be exposed while wet and then developed while wet. So, they couldn't climb down the tree with the plates. They had to lower them with a pulley system," he explained. After a few more stories and photos, it was time to put on the 3D glasses. The room was transformed into something you might have seen in a movie theater in the 1950s or '60s. "I think that 70% of the documentary photos of the Civil War were shot in 3D, and this is the way they were meant to be seen. This is the way they were seen most often by people in the Civil War," Zeller said. "3D photography came into vogue with the development of the glass plate negative right at the eve of the Civil War." Referring again to the screen, he pointed out, "This is a photographer. You can see his darkroom wagon. He worked at the back of the wagon there, but most interestingly, he is holding a 4-by-10-inch glass plate, which was used to make two 4-by-5-inch exposures for a stereo view." Switching to another photograph, Zeller noted a fact that surprised some. "The first photographers of the Civil War were Confederate photographers," he said. "This photo was taken of the Lafayette Artillery practicing in Charleston around February 1861. Photographers James M. Osborne and Frederick E. Durbec in Charleston were the first photographers to take 3D photos of the war." To make a 3D photo during the Civil War, you start by taking two images, one for the left eye and one for the right — normally with a camera having two lenses. You would then print them side by side, aligning each with the corresponding eye. You would then view the finished image through a stereoscope, which only allowed the left eye to see the left image and the right the right image, tricking the brain into seeing depth in the photo. "Portraiture, they took photos in the studio with four-lens cameras for mass production purposes," Zeller said. "But if you have two separate photos from the two lenses on the top or bottom, you can recreate them and make a 3D portrait." Today we still make two images, but one with a red filter and the other with a blue filter. The two are then printed or projected slightly out of registration, and the 3D glasses filter out the image meant for the other eye. Thus, creating the same illusion of depth as the stereoscope of the Civil War. If you are interested in learning more about Civil War photography, check out The Center for Civil War Photography at https://www.civilwarphotography.org. If you are interested in learning more about the Civil War, the Tri-Cities Civil War Round Table will be hosting a presentation by Bennett Parten, Ph.D., titled "Sherman's March: A Journey Toward Freedom" at 7 p.m. on Monday, May 11, in Room 219 of the Toy F. Reid Employee Center, 400 S. Wilcox Drive in Kingsport. This presentation is free and open to the public. Ned Jilton II is a photographer, history lover and columnist. You can contact him at ndjphoto@aol.com.