A Southern View

Adalbert J. Volck (1828-1912)
[Caricature of Lincoln writing
the Emancipation Proclamation],
in V. Blada's War Sketches
London [Baltimore]: 1864
Lithograph
Rare Book & Special Collections Division (5.3)

During times of war, art often serves as propaganda, as artists seek to demonize the enemy and glorify a cause. During the American Civil War, no artist attacked the Northern war effort more savagely than the satirical printmaker and Southern sympathizer Adalbert J. Volck. A dentist by trade in Baltimore, Maryland, a city which harbored strong secessionist sentiment, Volck covertly published numerous scathing caricatures of Union leaders, including this portrayal of President Abraham Lincoln as the Devil himself, composing the Emancipation Proclamation while trampling the United States Constitution.