Battle of Monmouth

Period1868

MediumSteel engraving and watercolor on paper

Dimensions7.6 × 11 in. (19.3 × 27.9 cm)

InscribedInscribed lower left and lower right margin, "Painted by / Alonzo Chappel." Inscribed bottom center margin, "Entered according to act of Congress AD 1868 by Johnson, Fry & Co. in the clerks office of the District Court of the southern district of New York." Inscribed bottom center margin, "BATTLE OF MONMOUTH."

ClassificationsLandscapes & Still Life

Credit LineMarshall P. Blankarn Purchasing Fund, 1988

Object number1988.4.2

DescriptionA dynamic scene of troops engaged in battle. In the left foreground and center, American troops lead by an officer on horseback attack British troops. The British at right foreground and background rally around their flag, while additional troops in the background are held in reserve. The dead and injured occupy the foreground, near a pool of water in the lower left. In the left distance, a one and a half story farmhouse is depicted, with a one story addition to its left. A barn appears to its right. A cluster of trees separate the American troops from the British.
Curatorial RemarksEngraved by Robert Hinshelwood (1812 - 1879) after an oil painting by Alonzo Chappel (1828 - 1887), Battle of Monmouth was published in volume one of Henry B. Dawson’s Battles of the United States by Sea and Land (1868). Chappel relied on Benson J. Lossing’s Pictorial Field of the Revolution (1851–52) in composing the scene, which, despite its amalgamation of two events that occurred at different times of day, gives the viewer a sense of the frenzy of the Monmouth battlefield.NotesThis engraving illustrates two aspects of the battle: the foreground shows the late afternoon attack by General Anthony Wayne on the retreating first battalion of British grenadiers. The background features the storming of the hedgerow by the second battalion of grenadiers, which took place earlier in the day. The Old Tennent Parsonage appears in the upper left of the image.

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