Fort Hell

As a kid, I drew these huge, unlikely, sprawling, underground tunnel maps. Entire warrens of bedrooms, kitchens, storage space, booby traps, whatever I could think up and fit in. To me, this looks like the entrance to just such a world.

Petersburg, Virgina

1865, photographer Alexander Gardner

from the NYPL

the development of a bird

It's amazing how much it takes to make one creature. They look so pleased to be free from their shells in the end.

Das Meer by M. J. Schleiden

1869

from the NOAA Photo Library

People Trafficking

This group of severely emaciated boys and young men on the lower deck of a Royal Naval ship apparently have been taken from what was a slave vessel trading illegally off the African coast headed to the Americas. The captain of the Royal Naval ship had instructions not to return the rescued slaves to the place on the coast where they had been put on the slave ship (presumably because they were in danger of being recaptured by traders) but it is not clear from the available documentation what happened to them afterwards.

(text from here)

Atlantic Ocean
1869
from UK National Archives

John F. Claghorn, Civil War Veteran

Together, these two photos tell a story that I can't imagine living through. Why did they remove the bone and not the arm? Did he retain use of that hand?

Newark, NJ
1860s
from New York Public Library

The Government and Flag

And you think our current politics are contentious.

Civil War Era political ribbon,
from a telegram sent by John A. Dix, United States Secretary of the Treasury, to Treasury agents:
"If any one attempts to haul down the American flag, shoot him on the spot."
1860s
from Cornell University Library

Interior of the Drawing Room, Mar Lodge

How can she sleep with the curtains screaming at her like that?

Scotland
1863, Victor Albert Prout
from National Galleries of Scotland

Just click on it and check out the details in the larger version. I've got nothing to add. Except that I think the knight on the mouse is my favorite part. 

Don Quixote by Miguel de Cervantes

1863, illustration by Gustave Doré

from Candlelight Stories

wreck of blockade-runner

If it was easy and safe, everyone would be a smuggler.

One half of a stereograph pair. Sullivan's Island, S.C.
1865
from American Memory

a specter

Death wants a hug.

Henri Robin
1863
from hastingsgraham's flickr stream

Powder monkey of USS New Hampshire

How old do you think that kid was? And how do sailor suits manage to be both dorky and cool at the same time, no matter what era?

Off Charleston, SC
1864
from Pixdaus