Henry Ward Beecher

George Augustus Baker Jr.

Brooklyn Museum photograph

Object Label

Henry Ward Beecher, the theatrical Congregationalist pastor of Brooklyn's Plymouth Church and a powerful antislavery orator (and the brother of Hamet Beecher Stowe, author of Uncle Tom's Cabin), has been criticized by modern historians for convincing a wide national audience that abolition should be achieved gradually through the Christianization of African-American slaves, Despite his avoidance of radical abolitionist measures, his oratory nevertheless remained a powerful wartime force. He offered the following indictment of the complicity of New Yorkers in the practice of slavery: "We clothe ourselves with the cotton which the slave tills . . . It is you and I that wear the shirt and consume the luxury. Our looms and our factories are largely built on the slave's bones. We live on his labor."

Caption

George Augustus Baker Jr. American, 1821–1880. Henry Ward Beecher, 1874. Oil on canvas, 30 1/8 x 25 1/8in. (76.5 x 63.8cm). Brooklyn Museum, Gift of the American Art Council, 1999.54.1. No known copyright restrictions (Photo: Brooklyn Museum, 1999.54.1_reference_SL1.jpg)

Gallery

Not on view

Collection

American Art

Title

Henry Ward Beecher

Date

1874

Medium

Oil on canvas

Classification

Painting

Dimensions

30 1/8 x 25 1/8in. (76.5 x 63.8cm)

Signatures

Signed lower left: "G.A. Baker / 1874"

Credit Line

Gift of the American Art Council

Accession Number

1999.54.1

Rights

No known copyright restrictions

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