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Lewis Wallace

Lewis Wallace
Artist
Charles DeForest Fredricks, 11 Dec 1823 - 25 May 1894
Sitter
Lewis Wallace, 10 Apr 1827 - 15 Feb 1905
Date
c. 1862
Type
Photograph
Medium
Albumen silver print
Dimensions
Image/Sheet: 9.2 × 5.6 cm (3 5/8 × 2 3/16")
Mount: 10.1 × 6.3 cm (4 × 2 1/2")
Topic
Home Furnishings\Furniture\Seating\Chair
Home Furnishings\Furniture\Table
Personal Attribute\Facial Hair\Beard
Photographic format\Carte-de-visite
Interior\Studio\Photography
Lewis Wallace: Male
Lewis Wallace: Literature\Writer
Lewis Wallace: Military and Intelligence\Army\Officer\Civil War\Union Army
Lewis Wallace: Politics and Government\Politician
Portrait
Credit Line
National Portrait Gallery, Smithsonian Institution; gift of Mrs. F.B. Wilde
Restrictions & Rights
CC0
Object number
NPG.83.284.27
Exhibition Label
Born Brookville, Indiana
A practicing lawyer in Indiana at the start of the Civil War, Lew Wallace volunteered his services to the Union cause and rose to the rank of major general. In July 1864, he commanded the federal forces that deterred Confederates under General Jubal Early from encroaching upon the U.S. capital. At war’s end he represented the government at the court-martials of the Lincoln assassination conspirators, as well as that of Henry Wirz, the commander of the Union prison camp at Andersonville, Georgia.
Wallace, however, is best remembered as the author of Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ (1880), which was one of the best-selling novels of the nineteenth century. The book has never gone out of print and has inspired two movie versions, the last in 1959 featuring Charlton Heston as Ben Hur.
Data Source
National Portrait Gallery
Location
Currently not on view