Outdoor albumen carte de visite. New Berne, North Carolina: J.D. Heywoods, [ca 1864]. Photographer's imprint stamped to mount verso.

A rare outdoor view of an African American man tending a pinto horse with a large 35-star American flag waving from a porch, clearly visible in the background. The flag dates the image to the late war, after West Virginia joined the Union in 1863. After the successful Burnside Expedition, coastal North Carolina came under early Union control and Federal forces occupied New Bern. The area became a hub for escaped and newly emancipated slaves. The flag may have been flying from the house of a Union officer, eager to display the Stars & Stripes.

John D. Heywood is known to have taken other images Black population in the late War and early Reconstruction, including a view of a Freedmen's School (Smithsonian, National Museum of African American History & Culture, 2020.10.9.2).

[African Americana, African American History, Black History, Women's History, Quakers, Quaker History, Early Photography, Historic Photography, Albumen Photography, CDV, CDVs, Cartes de Visite, Carte de Visite, Carte-de-Visite, Cabinet Card, Daguerreotype, Ambrotype, Tintype, Cased Images]