Working location

The parapet of Fort Sumter

Fort Sumter · Charleston Harbor, South Carolina

A place photographs were made FROM, rather than a business. George S. Cook and James Osborn set up here on 8 September 1863 and worked under fire. In April 1865 Barnard photographed Sam Cooley standing beside his camera on the same parapet — one photographer’s picture of another at work, which is why we know what the work looked like.

Who worked here

What is there now

The fort survives, though what stands is largely the sand-and-rubble work the bombardment left, with later alterations.

Where the address comes from

  • Prints and Photographs Division, Library of Congress, Washington, D.C. https://www.loc.gov/pictures/
  • Stephen Davis and Jack W. Melton Jr., 100 Significant Civil War Photographs: Charleston in the War (Charleston: Historical Publications LLC, 2020).

Where the coordinate comes from

Sources