The Petersburg Project
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    • About Us
  • Blog and Updates
  • Civil War Combat Trenching
  • Views of the City of Petersburg
    • Petersburg Panorama 1865
    • Steeples of Petersburg
    • Petersburg Mill Photographs
  • The Mine Explosion and its Crater
  • Petersburg in Pencil and Ink
    • Alfred R. Waud, Special Artist at Petersburg >
      • Waud Drawing of 5th Corps Fortifications
    • William Waud, Special Artist
    • Charles H. Chapin, Special Artist
    • Joseph Becker, Special Artist at Petersburg
    • Edwin Forbes, Special Artist at Petersburg
    • Winslow Homer, Special Artist
    • Edward Mullen, Special Artist at Petersburg
    • Andrew W. Warren, Special Artist
    • Enlisted Artists >
      • Charles Wellington Reed
      • Andrew McCallum
      • Francis Knowles
      • James William Pattison
      • Herbert Valentine
      • Howard A. Camp
  • Petersburg Photographs --So Many!
    • Dimmock Battery 5 Photographs >
      • Working with Photographs
    • City Point
    • City Point Wharf Explosion, Aug. 9, 1864
    • Fort Rice?? We don't think so!
    • Federal Picket Line, Jerusalem Plank Road
    • Egbert Guy Fowx, Photographer at Petersburg
    • Timothy O'Sullivan, Photographer at Petersburg >
      • Harrison's Creek USCT Camps
      • Fort Morton and Baxter Road Group
      • Fort Haskell Panorama and Bomb Proofs
      • Fort Stedman Group
      • Gracie's Salient Group
      • Camp of the 50th N. Y. Engineers
    • David Knox, Photographer at Petersburg
    • William Redish Pywell, Photographer at Petersburg
    • John Reekie, Photographer at Petersburg
    • Thomas C. Roche, Photographer at Petersburg
    • Andrew J. Russell, Photographer at Petersburg >
      • "Fort Mahone" CS Batteries 25 & 27
  • U. S. Military Railroad
    • Terminus of Military R. R. at City Point
    • City Point to Clark's Station
    • Pitkin's Station to Shooting Hill
    • Hancock's Junction/Jerusalem Plank Road
    • Parke's Station
    • Warren's Station
    • Patrick's Station
  • Topographical Engineers -- Our Heroes
    • Grand Medicine Pow-wow
    • Michler's Reports from Topographical Department
    • John E. Weyss, Cartographer
    • William H. Paine, Cartographer
    • Gilbert Thompson
    • Albert Hanry Campbell, C.S.A. Cartographer
  • Confederate Maps
    • Confederate Defenses 1862
    • Gilmer-Campbell Maps, 1864
    • Stevens Map July 1864
    • Fields of Fire
    • Campbell Dinwiddie County 1864
    • Coit's map of the Crater Battlefield
  • Federal Maps
    • Army of the Potomac, Routes of the Corps to Petersburg
    • June 9 1864, Kautz Attack
    • June 18, 1864-Federal Engineers Maps
    • June 18, 1864, 18th Corps
    • June 19, 1864, Engineers Map
    • June 21, 1864, Federal Engineers Maps
    • June 22, 1864. Second Corps at Jerusalem Plank Road
    • June 29, 1864. Dept of VA and NC
    • June 30, 1864 -- XVIII Corps Map
    • June-July, Undated Federal Engineers Map-
    • July 29, 1864, Engineers Map, Annotated
    • July 1864 Map of XVIII Corps Lines
    • Crater, Native American Perspective of the Crater
    • August 1864, Michie Map - Bermuda 100
    • August 28, 1864, Michler Map
    • Aug.-Nov. 1864 Two Base Maps
    • September 13, 1864, Recon Map
    • Sept. 13-Oct.25 versions. Redoubts and Batteries
    • September 30, 1864, Warren Map
    • October 1864, Two IX Corps Maps
    • October 20, 1864. Benham's map of defenses of City Point
    • Nov. 2, 1864, Army of the Potomac
    • 1864, Coast Survey Map of Petersburg
    • Michler Map Series 1865-1867
    • 1864-1867, Michler-Weyss, Siege of Petersburg
    • 1865-1867, Manuscript Survey Maps
    • 1871, Map of Recapture of Ft. Stedman
    • 1881, Boydton Plank Road
  • Confederate Forts and Batteries
    • Dimmock Line >
      • Priest Cap
      • French Rifle Pits
    • Fort Clifton
    • "Fort Mahone" CS Batteries 25 & 27
    • Confederate 8-inch Columbiad
    • Leadworks
  • Federal Forts and Batteries
    • Union Battery Ten (X)
    • Fort Alexander Hayes
    • Fort Avery
    • Fort Conahey
    • Fort Davis & Battery XXII
    • Fort Fisher
    • Fort Meikel --Photographic Views
    • Fort Morton
    • Fort Patrick Kelly
    • Fort Sedgwick, better known as Fort Hell,
    • Fort Wadsworth -- the Evolution
    • Fort Willcox or Battery XVI
  • Battlefield Features
    • Aiken House
    • Armstrong's Mill
    • Avery House
    • Bailey/Johnston Farm
    • Blandford Church
    • Broadway Landing, Appomattox River
    • The Crater
    • Cummings House
    • Dams and Inundations
    • WW Davis Farm
    • Dunn House
    • Friend House >
      • View from Friend House toward Gibben complex and Petersburg
    • Gibbons Properties
    • Globe Tavern / Weldon Railroad
    • Gregory House
    • Griffith Farm
    • Gurley House
    • Hare House Hill
    • The "Horseshoe"
    • Jerusalem Plank Road
    • Jones House
    • Jordan House
    • Newmarket Racecourse
    • Pegram's Farm
    • Peebles Farm, Pegrams Farm, Poplar Springs Church
    • Shands House
    • Taylor Farm >
      • The Ice House
      • Surviving Taylor Barn
    • Williams House
  • Signal Towers and Trees
    • Some Operations of the Signal Corps at Petersburg
  • Archeology
    • Geology of the Crater
    • Fieldwork -- Petersburg
    • Civil War Sinks
    • Deserted Confederate Camp
    • Gracie's Countermine
    • LIDAR Forts and Batteries
  • Articles, Papers, Presentations
    • Shiman: A Note on Maps
    • The Siege Landscape: Through Fire and Ice at Petersburg
    • "The Rebel in the Road"
    • "A Strange Sort of Warfare Underground"
    • Lost Trenches of Petersburg: June 17
    • Between the Lines
    • Combat Trenching: An Introduction
    • Lowe -- Post-War Topographical Survey
    • Civil War Maps and Landscapes -- Observations
  • Kittens, Puppies & Ponies
  • Executions!
  • Notes on Leveled Earthworks
  • Depot Hospital at City Point
  • Pontoon Bridges
  • The Great Pontoon Bridge Across James River
  • Captain Robert Davis CSA
Picture
Sketch by Joseph Becker, published in the American Magazine, vol. 37 (1894): 749.

Joseph Becker (1841-1910), Special Artist for Leslie's Illustrated at Petersburg

​Born in Pottsville, Pennsylvania, in 1841, by age eighteen Joseph Becker had found work as a "printer's devil" for Frank Leslie’s Illustrated Newspaper in New York City. Although he lacked academic training, Becker learned from other artists on the staff and displayed a talent for sketching from life.  When Lee's army invaded Pennsylvania In 1863, Leslie dispatched Becker to the Army of the Potomac with instructions to draw what he saw and send drawings back to the newspaper. Becker's first sketches from the front following the battle of Gettysburg were fairly rudimentary, but he gained in skill and confidence during the 1864 Overland Campaign. His sketches from Petersburg were highly accomplished. Nearly 90 of his drawings of battle scenes and everyday soldier life, many unattributed,  were published in newspaper during the war. http://idesweb.bc.edu/becker/artists/josephbecker

After the war, Becker managed the art department at Leslie's for twenty-five years. He died in 1910 and is buried in Brooklyn. His collection of original wartime drawings, including his work and that of many other artists, formed the basis for the Becker Collection of 650 Civil War drawings held at Boston College. Most of these drawings are not available for download, but please visit the Boston College site.
​ 
http://idesweb.bc.edu/becker/about
Picture
"Sketches near the Weldon Railroad // A Fatigue or working party belonging to the 5th Corps on their way to the works in Front Aug 30th // [Signed] Joseph Becker // Pine woods." The Becker Collection (Becker) CW-JB-VA-8/30/64. Privates shouldered tools; noncoms evidently retained their rifle-muskets.
Picture
Becker Collection. "Something to Coax the Appetite: Exhuming the Bodies of Union Soldier (Siege of Petersburg), " drawing by Joseph Becker.
Picture
When the drawing to the left was published in Frank Leslie's Illustrated Newspaper on January 21, 1865, it had a much less flippant heading. It also was attributed to a different artist-J. E. Taylor-whose work we have not noted in the Petersburg vicinity as of yet. The work was probably Becker's.
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Becker Collection. "Burying the Dead (Siege of Petersburg)," drawing by Joseph Becker.
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