Background
George Barnard was born into a farming family in Coventry, Connecticut on December 23, 1819. His father died in 1826 and he grew up with relatives in a nearby town, apprenticing at various jobs in the family owned businesses.
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George Barnard was born into a farming family in Coventry, Connecticut on December 23, 1819. His father died in 1826 and he grew up with relatives in a nearby town, apprenticing at various jobs in the family owned businesses.
Starting his business in New York State in 1843, George Barnard was one of the first to use daguerreotype, the first commercially available form of photography, in the United States. A fire in 1853 destroyed the grain elevators in Oswego, New York, an event Barnard photographed. Historians consider these some of the first "news" photographs. Barnard also photographed Abraham Lincoln's 1861 inauguration.
George Barnard is best known for American Civil War era photos. He was the official army photographer for the Military Division of the Mississippi, which mostly involved photographing and documenting fortifications, bridges, and documents.
His 1866 book, Photographic Views of Sherman's Campaign, showed the devastation of the war. The book includes 61 albumen prints in Nashville, the Chattanooga Valley, Atlanta, and Savannah. He took the photos while operating under General Sherman's command. The book also includes a studio portrait of Sherman and his generals.
After the war, George Barnard ran photography studios in Ohio, Charleston, South Carolina and Chicago. His Chicago studio burned down in the 1871 city fire. In Rochester, New York, he briefly worked with George Eastman, the founder of the Eastman Kodak Company.
George Barnard married in 1843.
