Edward Anthony
1862
The Great Surrender

Carte de visite
Archive Farms
The Patrick Montgomery Collection, Object No. 2015.868a
 
Published by Edward Anthony in 1862, *The Great Surrender* is a brilliant and highly effective example of early satirical photomontage used to soothe a bruised national ego. This clever *carte de visite* was created in direct response to the resolution of the "Trent Affair" of late 1861. During this severe diplomatic crisis, the U.S. Navy illegally intercepted a British mail ship to capture two Confederate diplomats, an act that nearly dragged Great Britain into the American Civil War on the side of the South. Facing the disastrous prospect of a two-front war, President Abraham Lincoln and Secretary of State William H. Seward were forced into an embarrassing corner, ultimately deciding to release the prisoners back into British custody to avoid an international conflict.
 
To spin this painful political concession for the Northern public, Anthony’s studio pasted actual photographic portrait heads onto caricatured, hand-drawn bodies to illustrate a face-saving, three-way compromise. On the far left, British Foreign Secretary Lord John Russell stands appeased and triumphant atop the British lion. In the center, the captured Confederate diplomats, James Murray Mason and John Slidell, are shown aboard a ship being formally returned by U.S. Secretary of State William H. Seward, who gestures firmly from the right shore. Finally, in the background near the American eagle, Confederate President Jefferson Davis is depicted walking away dejected and empty-handed. Through this pocket-sized piece of visual propaganda, a bitter pill was successfully sold to the masses as a mutual victory: America surrendered the diplomats, England surrendered its threats of war, and the Confederacy surrendered its great hopes of European intervention.
 
LL/115814