The Philadelphia Print Shop has one of the most extensive selections on antique prints of Native Americans available anywhere. From life-portraits of individual chiefs, warriors and women to first-hand depictions of typical events in the lives of the American Indians, these rare images are both dramatically decorative and historically fascinating.
A dramatic, large engraving based on F.O.C. Darley's drawing of the Wyoming Valley massacre. Darley is perhaps best known as America's first great illustrator, producing numerous images for books and magazines in the nineteenth century. He also, though, produced many historical images which were made into separate folio prints. Indeed, such was Darley's influence through his illustrations and prints that he must be seen as seminal in the forging of the American national identity. This print shows the fight on July 3, 1777 between Patriot militia and Loyalist troops supported by Indian allies in the Wyoming Valley in northern Pennsylvania. After a brief but fierce battle, the militia troops fled, only to be pursed, especially by the Indians, who killed and tortured those they could catch. This "massacre" became a rallying point for Patriots leading to retaliation in the Sullivan-Clinton campaign against the Iroquois in 1779. This print was supposed to be "First of a Series of national Engravings" to be issued by W.H. Holbrooke, or both New York and London, but none others seem to have been issued. $1,200
"Murder of Miss McCrea." Philadelphia, probably 1840s. Lithograph by Thomas Sinclair. 10 5/8 x 15 3/4. Conserved with expertly repaired tear into right margin and indications of former folds from having been inserted into a octavo book or magazine.
Jane McCrea was a lovely young American girl from a Tory family who lived in the Hudson Valley of New York during the American Revolution. Her fiancée was a British Army officer in Gen. Burgoyne's campaign from Canada in 1777. She was murdered by Indian allies of the British under circumstances that were then and now unclear, but the American patriots used the death to accuse the British of using Indians to kill other white men, and many Tories lost faith in the British because the ability of loyalist armies to protect civilians became doubtful. By the time of this publication the print could have been used to illustrate a captivity narrative, a popular literary genre, or to enflame general anti-Indian sentiments. The horror of her killing is enhanced by scenes in the dark forest background: to left a white man is killed by two Indians and to the right side a viper threatens a squirrel in a tree. Fascinating American gothic. $450
George Catlin. "Buffalo Hunt, Chase." Plate 7. From Catlin's North American Indian Portfolio. London: G. Catlin, 1844. Folio; 12 1/4 x 18 1/2. Lithograph drawn by McGahey and printed by Day & Hague. Full original hand color. Very good condition.
The prints of George Catlin mark a poignant and heroic moment in the history of American art and culture. Setting out to chronicle and immortalize Indian culture, Catlin's career was one of mid-19th century pioneer adventure and spirit colored by the ideal of the 'noble savage' in his pristine environment. In 1830 he went out to St. Louis and from there traveled extensively for several years to Indian villages along the Platte and Missouri rivers and then later to tribes throughout the mid and far west. The result was some 500 paintings and one of the most significant chronicles of Indian life and culture ever produced. The prints Catlin later published from his paintings, with their fascinating and important subjects, as well as their rich color, detail and artistic worth, are a noble legacy from Catlin's memorable career. During his sojourn in the west, Catlin spent much time recording the customs of the Native Americans, including their hunting techniques. This image shows the action of a buffalo hunt in graphic detail. One Indian, whose horse seems to have been knocked over by a dying buffalo, stands and shoots his arrow at another beast, while nearby a mounted hunter sends an arrow true into the side of a massive bull. A third figure in the foreground shows a brave stepping from his galloping mount, about to be gored by a buffalo, onto the back of another thundering beast. The action, detail of costume and weapons, makes this print a terrific combination of ethnological artifact and aesthetic masterpiece. $5,750
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Karl Bodmer. "Abdih- Hiddisch. A Minatarre Chief." Tab. 24. From Travels In the Interior of North America in the Years 1832 to 1834. London: Ackermann and Company, 1839-1843. 10 x 12 1/2. Aquatint. Full hand color. Very good condition.
Karl Bodmer, (1809-1893), is considered by many to be the greatest 19th-century artist to have produced prints of the American west. Bodmer and his patron, Prince Maximilian of Wied, came to America from Germany in 1832. With Bodmer in charge of the pictorial documentary, Prince Maximilian, an experienced and respected traveler and naturalist, set out to put together as complete a study as possible of the western territories of the United States. The result was the publication of Maximilian's journals in successive German, French, and English editions between 1839 and 1843, and with it, a picture atlas of eighty-one aquatint plates after paintings by Bodmer. This picture volume is now regarded as one of the most comprehensive and memorable visual surveys of the western territories ever made. The prints provide a rare and privileged glimpse into 19th-century America by one of the now most coveted artists of the period. This is one of Bodmer's series of portrait prints and it demonstrates the quality of all his work. $9,500
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Karl Bodmer. No. 35. "Indianer Geschmückt Mit Den Zeichen Seiner Kriegsthaten. Indien décoré des emblèmes de ses faits d'armes." From H.R. Schinz's Naturgeschichte und Abbildungen des Menschen. Zurich: Honeggerschen Lithographischen Anstalt, 1845. Ca. 11 x 8. Lithograph by J. Honegger. Full hand color. Very good condition.
Just two years after the publication of Maximilian's monumental Travels In the Interior of North America, H.R. Schinz issued a natural history, with a focus on humans of different races, which included as illustrations images after Bodmer. The very fine lithographs, of which this is one, were drawn by J. Honegger and they are close reduced versions of the aquatint prints. These are the earliest and largest derivatives of Bodmer's images, and are if anything rarer than the aquatints. These are fine examples of the output of on of the greatest chroniclers of Native Americans. $1,600
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"The Sioux War-Cavalry Charge of Sully's Brigade at the Battle of White Stone Hill, September 3, 1863." From Harper's Weekly. New York: October 21, 1863. 9 x 14. Wood engraving.
Harper's Weekly was a weekly newspaper filled with woodblock illustrations by many of the leading American artists of the last half of the nineteenth century. It, and other illustrated newspapers of the day, provide one of the only sources for contemporary images of the American West during the nineteenth century. Drawn by a number of expert artists, including Frederic Remington, Charles Graham, R.F. Zogbaum and Thomas Moran, these images are just now beginning to be appreciated not only as decorative and affordable, but as having their own historic value for the collector. This is a fine contemporary view of a Cavalry charge during the Sioux War of 1863. $75
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Prints by Arthur Schott. From William Emory's Report of the United States and Mexican Boundary Survey. Washington:GPO, 1857; Cornelius Wendell, Printer. Ca. 8 x 5 1/2. Color lithographs. Very good condition, except as noted.
The border with Mexico first established at the end of the Mexican-American War ran along the Gila River and unfortunately the only feasible southern route for a railroad ran through Mexico. This prompted renewed negotiations, resulting in the Gadsden Purchase, acquiring for the United States enough land to run the railroad line. William H. Emory, a topographical engineer who had previously done surveying in the southwest was appointed to survey the new border. This is the report that resulted from his survey, and it includes not only the geographic information and maps required, but much other information on the natural history and physical character of these newly acquired lands. The views were drawn by Arthur Schott, a German-born scientist, artist and musician who was appointed as a "special scientific collector," to gather botanical, geological, and zoological specimens, as well as making notes and drawings of the land and its flora and fauna. One of the most important results were his first-hand images of the Indian tribes, including Seminole, Lipan Apache, Yumas, and Kiowa.
Currier & Ives were America's printmakers. Their large corpus of lithographs documented the interests, tastes and thoughts of many Americans in the nineteenth century. This portrait of "The Indian Beauty" provides a most interesting look at one conception of the American Indian at a time when some felt that Native Americans were savages and impediments towards western expansion. This charming young beauty is decked out in finery that owes more to East Coast Victorian taste than to native design, and indeed her visage is more Caucasian than Indian. While not an accurate picture of a real Indian Beauty, this is an fascinating reflection of what some thought was an appropriate image. $375
James Adair. The History of the American Indians; Particularly Those Nations Adjoining to the Missisippi [sic], East and West Florida, Georgia, South and North Carolina, and Virginia . . . Also an Appendix, containing a Description of the Floridas, and the Missisippi [sic] Lands . . . Georgiana . . . Civilizing the Indians . . . to make all the Colonies more valuable to the Mother Country. London: E. & C. Dilly, 1775. Quarto. 5l., 464pp. with half title. Folding map. Half leather with marbled boards. Ex libris with attractive bookplate in front and two unobtrusive internal ink stamps. Some transferring at title page and map and slight internal spotting, else a fine copy.
The author was actively trading with the Indians of the southeast, and his work included the Catawba, the Cherokee and the Chickasaw among others from 1735 to 1759. While trying to prove that the Indians were descended from a lost tribe of Israel, he recounted many customs. This is a valuable, first hand observation with a superb map. Ref.: Sabin, 155; Vail, 643; and Cumming/DeVorsey 448. $3,400
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