[Unidentified police officer wearing a Grand Army of the Republic badge]

Archive record

1 photograph : albumen print on mount ; sheet 141 x 101 mm, mount 164 x 106 mm (cabinet card format)

About this photograph

The photograph shows an unidentified police officer wearing a badge of the Grand Army of the Republic, the fraternal organisation of Union veterans founded in 1866, the same year this portrait was made.

The subject holds the dual identity common among Northern men after the war: civic employment in peacetime and membership in the veteran's association that campaigned for pensions and organised memorial observances. That he appears in both his police role and veteran's regalia suggests the photograph marked his affiliation with the newly established organisation.

R. H. Child created the portrait as a cabinet card, the larger photographic format that became standard in the late 1860s.

The Grand Army of the Republic members wore distinctive badges and uniforms to encampments and parades. Many later portraits show elderly veterans in this regalia rather than their wartime dress, though this early example captures a man likely still in the prime of working life.

Compiled from the catalogue record and reference notes on the formats and events involved. The archive record above is the primary source.

About the format

Rights & Attribution

Explore

More from the 1860s

[Portrait of a Liberian man]

1866

[Portrait of an infant]

1866

[Full-length portrait of an African American veteran and GAR member, standing on rug between table and chair]

1866

Andrew Johnson

1866

[Alfred H. Colquitt, head-and-shoulders portrait, facing right]

1866

[Buffalo soldier, African American officer, Lt. 1st Infantry, four button sack with crossed rifles and "1" on kepi]

1866