(NEW YORK CITY) Tweed and His Generals

Sale 2344 - Lot 203

Price Realized: $ 875

?Final Price Realized includes Buyer’s Premium added to Hammer Price

Estimate: $ 300 - $ 400

(NEW YORK CITY.) Tweed and His Generals. Lithograph, 22 1/4 x 34 1/4 inches to sight; worn, tears, laid down, lacking 6 x 2-inch area in lower right corner (filled). Not examined outside of frame. Washington: Frank Duffy, 1871

Set Alert for Similar Items

Additional Details

Depicts Boss Tweed with fifty of his favorite cronies over the caption "These men fought their way nobly from the ranks and were promoted for merit on the field." The "Generals" are not identified, although notorious Parks Commissioner Peter B. Sweeney seems to be the mustachioed man to Tweed's right. Overhead are insets of Tweed's Americus Engine Company and the United States Capitol.
Although this might seem like a satire of Tweed's corrupt administration, it was apparently commissioned by frustrated office-seeker Frank Duffy as an effort to flatter Tweed. The humorous story was told in Breen's 1899 memoir "Thirty Years of New York Politics," pages 219-220. Apparently Duffy collected five and ten dollar fees from each city employee who was pictured--extra fees were charged for the spots closest to Tweed. When the print was released, however, it was mocked widely by the press, and Tweed refused to acknowledge it. Poor Mr. Duffy was rebuffed and never did get his cushy patronage appointment; he opened a saloon in Bay Ridge, Brooklyn and was later indicted for manslaughter.
The story of "Tweed and His Generals" has been recounted several times, but we know of no other extant copies of the actual print, either in libraries or at auction.