Panorama of the The Union Army of the Cumberland

Rosecrans, William S.

Late in the American Civil War (1861&#8211;1865), veterans of the Union Army of the Cumberland, believing that General William S. Rosecrans had been unfairly removed from command in 1864, engaged William D. T. Travis to paint a documentary of the general's career. As a staff artist for <I>Harper's Weekly</I> and the <I>New York Illustrated News,</I> Travis had followed the army, seeing and sketching much of what he later painted. This scene, the first of 32 on the huge panorama produced by Travis, represents the young soldier's farewell to home and family. Each scene is 8 feet high and 16 feet long, on a single roll of canvas over 500 feet long. When he finished in May 1865, Travis took the panorama on tour. The artist narrated from a prepared script as the canvas was wound from one of two great spindles to the other. From 1865 to 1871, in lecture halls and churches throughout the Midwest, Travis displayed the panorama to considerable acclaim.