?Final Price Realized includes Buyer’s Premium added to Hammer Price
Estimate: $ 3,000 - $ 4,500
(ALEXANDER GARDNER) (1821-1882) Suite of 3 photographs documenting the hanging of the Lincoln conspirators, and 3 documenting the hanging of Confederate Captain Wirz, the "keeper" of Andersonville Prison. Warm-toned silver prints, the conspirator images measuring approximately 7 1/2x9 1/2 inches (19.1x24.1 cm.), the Wirz trio slightly larger, the ruled mounts all 11x14 inches (27.9x35.6 cm.), each with a series number and a caption, in green ink, on a small label on mount recto; the second of the Lincoln series also with a longer printed caption on mount recto, affixed over the first label. 1865; printed early 1900s
The first of the Lincoln conspirator images depicts the condemned arriving on the platform, the second show the nooses and hoods being adjusted, and the last titled "Finis," documenting the four hanging figures, with some in the crowd looking away or at the camera.
The second trio documents the hanging of Captain Wirz, who was in command of the horrific prisoner of war camp at Andersonville. Wirz was one of the few members of the Confederacy who were tried and convicted for war crimes after the Civil War. This set shows the reading of the death warrant, the adjustment of the ropes, and his body hanging from the scaffold. For this last image, Gardner moved his camera, symbolically framing the image with the Capitol Buliding in the background. Onlookers lean over walls, stand below, and even look on from treetops around the complex.
