1867 Thomas Nast Portrait & Biography, Hancock's Indian Village — May 11
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🗞️ HARPER'S WEEKLY · May 11, 1867
Complete Issue · New York
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A collector's issue of genuine rarity — Harper's Weekly's own portrait and biographical feature on Thomas Nast, the most celebrated political illustrator in America, published at the height of his Reconstruction-era powers, alongside General Hancock's captured Cheyenne village with its teepees and an old Sioux prisoner. A primary document of Nast's career as seen by his own publication, in the same year he produced the Amphitheatrum Johnsonianum, Southern Justice, Prometheus Bound, and Lincoln & the Drummer Boy.
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🎨 THOMAS NAST — PORTRAIT AND BIOGRAPHY
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🖼️ PORTRAIT AND BIOGRAPHY — "MR. THOMAS NAST"
Harper's Weekly's own portrait and biographical feature on Thomas Nast — the man Abraham Lincoln called "our best recruiting sergeant" and the most powerful political illustrator in America. Published in May 1867, at the exact moment Nast was producing some of the most significant political illustrations in American history — including the Amphitheatrum Johnsonianum (March 30), Southern Justice (March 23), Prometheus Bound (March 2), "We Accept the Situation" (April 13), and "Abraham Lincoln and the Drummer Boy" (April 27, held by the Metropolitan Museum of Art) — this portrait and biography is Harper's Weekly's own assessment of the artist who was reshaping American political culture from its pages. The Southern Reconstruction issue of Harper's Weekly noted of Nast's recent work that it was "very significant. They tell their own story."
Thomas Nast (1840-1902) would go on to create the Republican elephant, the Tammany Hall tiger, the modern visual image of Santa Claus, and Uncle Sam as we know him today. He would bring down Boss Tweed's corrupt Tammany machine through his cartoons in 1871. A portrait and biography of Nast published by his own magazine, in the year of his greatest Reconstruction-era output, is a primary document of one of the most important figures in the history of American art and political journalism. An essential piece for any Nast collector.
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🪶 HANCOCK'S INDIAN VILLAGE
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🏕️ HALF PAGE — "LODGES OF THE CHIEFS IN THE INDIAN VILLAGE CAPTURED BY GEN. HANCOCK" — MANY TEEPEES
A half-page illustration of the Cheyenne village captured and burned by General Winfield Scott Hancock during the Hancock Expedition of April 1867 — a pivotal and deeply controversial event in the Indian Wars. When Hancock's forces surrounded the Cheyenne village on Pawnee Fork in Kansas on the night of April 14-15, the villagers fled into the darkness fearing a massacre like Sand Creek in 1864. Hancock ordered the village — with its 251 lodges, thousands of pounds of provisions, weapons, and equipment — burned to the ground. The destruction outraged the Cheyenne and Arapaho and triggered the very war Hancock had claimed to be preventing, launching the summer 1867 campaigns that included the Fetterman aftermath and Custer's controversial operations. A significant and historically charged piece of Indian Wars history and the destruction of Plains Indian material culture.
👴 ILLUSTRATION — "OLD SIOUX INDIAN CAPTURED BY GEN. HANCOCK"
An illustration of an elderly Sioux man taken prisoner during Hancock's expedition — a humanizing and sobering counterpoint to the burning of the village, capturing one individual face of the conflict. A significant and unusual piece of Plains Indian portraiture from the Indian Wars era.
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📋 CONDITION
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I photograph every page of every issue so you can inspect the condition closely before purchasing. Please review all images carefully and don't hesitate to ask any questions — I'm happy to provide additional detail or close-up shots of any page, illustration, or area of concern before you buy.
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📌 DETAILS
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Publication ········ Harper's Weekly
Date ··············· May 11, 1867
City ··············· New York
Format ············· Illustrated newspaper, complete in 16 pages
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📦 SHIPPING & PRESERVATION
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• Stored in an acid-free protective bag and flat-shipped in a padded envelope with heavy cardboard reinforcement
• Fully tracked for your peace of mind
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🔍 SEO TAGS
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1867 Thomas Nast Portrait & Biography, Hancock's Indian Village — May 11
$34.56