Views in the Navy Ordnance Yard, Washington, D.C., June
1866
Medium
albumen print
Dimensions
image/sheet: 24.3 × 34.6 cm (9 9/16 × 13 5/8 in.) mount: 40.6 × 50.8 cm (16 × 20 in.)
Classification
Photograph
Department
CPH
Museum
National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.
Credit
Robert Menschel and the Vital Projects Fund
Accession Number
2020.51.1
Rights
Public Domain
Art Historical Context
Captured in June 1866, *Views in the Navy Ordn Yard, Washington, D.* is an albumen print by Mathew B. Brady, pioneering photographer renowned for his comprehensive documentation of the American Civil War Just a year after the war's end, this image offers a rare glimpse into the Washington Navy Yard—an essential hub for manufacturing cannons, ammunition, and naval supplies that had buzzed with wartime activity. Brady's lens shifts from battlefields to this industrial aftermath, highlighting the nation's transition from conflict to reconstruction amid lingering military infrastructure. As a mas...
About the Artist
Mathew B. Brady · 1823–1896
Mathew B. Brady (c. 1823–1896) was an American photographer who became the most famous photographer of the Civil War era and one of the founding figures of American photographic history. Born in Warren County, New York, to Irish immigrant parents, he learned the daguerreotype process from Samuel F.B. Morse and William Page and opened his first portrait studio in New York City in 1844. Brady quick...