Civil War Photos Online

A friend at the office sent me a link to this site with a nice collection Civil War era photos from the Library of Congress.

I liked the photo of Lincoln's first inauguration against the backdrop of the Capitol dome under construction, this one of the Old Trinity church with the Capitol in the background and this one taken from the cemetery at Harper's Ferry.

This image of Richmond is particularly striking with the ruins of the Gallego Mills overlooking the river.

Here's a very similar picture that comes from NARA's recent project to put the Brady Photos on Flickr:
The two photos are almost identical, but there are a few small differences and judging from the left bank of the canal, the one from NARA seems to have been taken from a little farther back.

And here's another picture of Richmond's ruined mills from the NARA Photo Stream:
You'll find more information about Gallego mills here and a picture of them before the fire here.

Color Photos From Russia 1909 to 1915

In 1948 the Library of Congress purchased a collection of color photographs from a photographic survey of Russia made between 1909 and 1912, and again in 1915, by Russian photographer Sergei Mikhailovich Prokudin-Gorskii (1863-1944).

Photographs from the collection can be viewed on this site. The intro to the project says,

"The photographs of Sergei Mikhailovich Prokudin-Gorskii (1863-1944) offer a vivid portrait of a lost world--the Russian Empire on the eve of World War I and the coming revolution. His subjects ranged from the medieval churches and monasteries of old Russia, to the railroads and factories of an emerging industrial power, to the daily life and work of Russia's diverse population."

Like the color photos from World War I mentioned in an earlier post, it's amazing how color makes these people and places seem more real and yet, particularly in these photos by Prokudin-Gorskii, the way he produced his color and the subjects he photographed give many of this pictures a remarkable, otherworldly feel.

Here are a few examples from the collection:

"The Emir of Bukhara, Alim Khan (1880-1944), poses solemnly for his portrait, taken in 1911 shortly after his accession."

"Wooden Chapel on the Site of Old Belozersk"

"Ethnic Russian settlers to the Mugan Steppe region, south of the Caucasus Mountains and west of the Caspian Sea..."

"Cathedral of St. Nicholas, Mozhaisk"


"Workers, identified by Prokudin-Gorskii as Greeks, pose while harvesting tea from plants spreading over rolling hills near Chakva, on the east coast of the Black Sea."

"In a photograph taken near Samarkand, an old man, probably an ethnic Tajik, holds birds he has just caught."