Side by Side: Two Civil War Paintings

Two paintings now on display at the Gettysburg National Military Park offer a vivid depiction of two unique perspectives of the Civil War. “The Armed Slave” depicts a slave reading a book with a cigar in hand and a bayonet-equipped musket close by, ready to spring to action in John Brown’s failed slave uprising of 1859. “The Old Veteran” depicts an aged man with a cane amidst a handsome memorial admiring a portrait of Ulysses S. Grant, his former supreme commander. Both were painted by Civil War veteran and artist William Spang of Pennsylvania after his service.