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Fort Trumbull, Connecticut
In 1775 Governor Jonathan Trumbull recommended the building of a fortification at the port of New London to protect the seat of the government of Connecticut. Built on a rocky point of land near the mouth of the Thames River on Long Island Sound, the fort was completed in 1777 and named for Governor Trumbull, who served from 1769 to 1784. In 1781 during the Revolutionary War, the fort was attacked and captured by British forces under the command of Benedict Arnold. In the early 19th century, the fort was redesigned and rebuilt to meet changing military needs. The present fortification was built between 1839 and 1852 as a five-sided, four-bastion coastal defense fort. During the Civil War, Fort Trumbull served as an organizational center for Union troops and headquarters for the 14th Infantry Regiment. Here, troops were recruited and trained before being sent to war. Today, the fort serves as a public park and tourist attraction.
Seth Eastman imagines a windless day on the river below the fort as the setting for a quiet, pleasant scene. The everyday aspects of this painting–-the boaters and people on the shore–-are, to our eyes, of greater interest than the fort. Many of the carefully detailed figures (10 in all) seem to be regarding the fort, and the viewer’s attention is held in this foreground area by the keenly observed, finely painted rocks and water grasses. The apparently abandoned fort seems clearly a thing of the past, now merely part of the pastoral scenery. The lack of military activity is emphasized by a small figure leaning casually against the wall of the fort at the right.
From the office of the United States Senate curator, we learn that in 1870, the House Committee on Military Affairs commissioned artist Seth Eastman to paint 17 images of important fortifications in the United States. He completed the works between 1870 & 1875. For many years, the fort paintings hung in the rooms assigned to the House Military Affairs Committee, first in the Capitol & later in the Cannon House Office Building. During the late 1930s, they were returned to the Capitol for public display. Of the 17 paintings, 8 are located in the Senate wing.
During the late 18th century & through much of the 19th century, army forts were constructed throughout the United States to defend the growing nation from a variety of threats, both perceived & real. Seventeen of these sites are depicted in a collection painted especially for the U.S. Capitol by Seth Eastman. Born in 1808 in Brunswick, Maine, Eastman found expression for his artistic skills in a military career. After graduating from the U.S. Military Academy at West Point, where officers-in-training were taught basic drawing & drafting techniques, Eastman was posted to forts in Wisconsin & Minnesota before returning to West Point as assistant teacher of drawing. Eastman also established himself as an accomplished landscape painter, & between 1836 & 1840, 17 of his oils were exhibited at the National Academy of Design in New York City. His election as an honorary member of the academy in 1838 further enhanced his status as an artist.
Transferred to posts in Florida, Minnesota, & Texas in the 1840s, Eastman became interesed in the Native Americans of these regions & made numerous sketches of the people & their customs. This experience prepared him for the next five yeas in Washington, D.C., where he was assigned to the commissioner of Indian Affairs & illustrated Henry Rowe Schoolcraft's important six-volume Historical & Statistical Information Respecting the History, Condition, & Prospects of the Indian Tribes of the United States. During this time Eastman also assisted Captain Montgomery C. Meigs, superintendent of the Capitol extension, in securing the services of several Native Americans to model for the sculptors working on the 1850s addition to the building.
In 1867 Eastman returned to the Capitol, this time to paint a series of nine scenes of Native American life for the House Committee on Indian Affairs. Eastman's talent & his special knowledge of the subject certainly qualified him for the commission, which was obtained for him by House Ways & Means Committee Chairman Robert C. Schenck of Ohio. Schenck, a former Civil War officer who, like Eastman, was retired for disability during the war, believed Amerian–-not European–-artists should recieve the Capitol commissions. In introducing a resolution urging the hiring of Eastman for the project, Schenck remarked:
"We have been paying for decorations, some displaying good taste & others of tawdry character, a great deal of money to Italian artists & others, while we have American talent much more competent for the work. Among others . . . is General Eastman, who . . . is more of an artist in all that relates to the Indians, except possibly Catlin & Stanley, than any we have had in this country. . . . If assigned to this duty General Eastman will draw his full pay as lieutenant colonel, instead of as on the retired list, making a difference of about $1,200 or $1,500 a year. For at the most $1,500 a year we will secure service for which we have been paying tens of thousands of dollars to foreign artists, & we will get better work done."
Schenck's resolution was approved by the House but tabled by the Senate. Nevertheless, the retired Eastman was placed–-by special order of the War Department–-on "active duty" so that he could be compensated for creating works of art for the Capitol. He finished the nine paintings in 1869. In 1870 House Military Affairs Committee Chairman John A. Logan of Illinois proposed that Eastman produce 17 canvases depicting army forts. It is indicative of the post-Civil War sentiment in America that Logan specified that Eastman was not to paint battle scenes; indeed, the mood of these forts set in landscapes is serene, even nostalgic to some degree. Never a well man, Eastman was aged & ailing by the time he received the commission, & it is not known if he visited the forts. He had been stationed at several of these during his military career, & as a trained topographical draftsman he probably had plans, elevations, & even photographs of the forts at his disposal. Eastman completed the series between 1870 & 1875.
Charles E. Fairman, longtime curator of the Capitol, was slightly dismissive of Eastman's fort paintings. He thought they were "probably more valuable as examples of historical accuracy . . . than for purely decorative purposes." He explained that it was important that knowledge concerning government fortifications should be easily accessible & these pictures "contain desired information & also relieve acceptably what might otherwise be blank spaces upon an uninteresting wall." Yet without touting Eastman's paintings as masterpieces, it is still possible to value them as considerably more than repositories of "desired information."
For many years, the fort paintings hung in the House Military Affairs Committee Room, first in the Capitol & later in the Cannon House Office Building. During the late 1930s, they were returned to the Capitol for public display. Of the 17 paintings, eight are located in the Senate, while the others are displayed on the House side of the Capitol. Eastman was working on the West Point painting when he died in 1875.