Horace Heath, Special Artist

Horace Heath bio

"View of Petersburg from the Signal Station on our Extreme Left -- sketched by Horace Heath, published as a woodcut in Harper's Weekly March 11, 1865. The fort in the left foreground is Fort Fisher undergoing reconstruction in February as a four-bastioned fort. Steeples of Petersburg in right distance.

Detail from the 8-in = 1 mi Michler map 1867, showing the location of the Signal Tower used by Heath.

The photograph below was taken from the same signal tower, looking more to the northeast centered on Fort Conahey. Historians have wondered why the photographer only took one image from atop the tower. If there were other images, they have not surfaced. It was a long climb and plates typically had to be exposed within ten minutes or so of being primed. 

LC 04090. View from the Peebles Farm signal tower looking north by northwest. Fort Conahey with its casemated guns is at the middle of the image. Surrounding camps appear to have been abandoned. Confederate lines were inside the distant tree line.

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Detail from the above photograph, showing steeples and buildings of Petersburg on an unfortunately misty day.