Die Schlacht von Bunker-Hill (The Battle of Bunker’s Hill)
Die Schlacht von Bunker-Hill (The Battle of Bunker’s Hill)
undated
Johann Georg Nordheim (1804-1853), after John Trumbull (1756–1843)
Hand-colored engraving
19 5/8 x 29 3/4 in. (49.8 x 75.6 cm)
John Trumbull called himself the “graphic historiographer” of the American Revolution. He intended his paintings to be not only commemorations of events but also “faithful portraits” of the people involved.
The painting (now at the Yale University Art Gallery) on which this print is based was made in 1786 in the London studio of Benjamin West (1738–1820). Trumbull represents a moment in one of the opening battles of the War of Independence: General Joseph Warren (1741–1775), hit by a musket ball, collapses in the arms of a fellow patriot. Among the combatants depicted here are two black men, both fighting on the American side. Peter Salem (ca. 1750–1816), who was granted freedom from slavery in order to join the military, may be just visible behind the principal group at left. At the bottom right, behind Lieutenant Thomas Grosvenor (1744–1825) of Connecticut is his servant, possibly Asaba Grosvenor. Trumbull, who witnessed the battle through field glasses while a soldier in the colonial army, later revisited this detail in an oil sketch.
2005.13.1
Yale University Art Gallery, Gift of Robert L. McNeil, Jr., B.S. 1936S
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