Wicked Bear of the Brulé Sioux, 1872
Alexander Gardner of Washington, D.C.

Two albumen print portraits of Wicked Bear (Ma-to-tzin-tzi-tsah), a Brulé (Sichangu) Sioux chief who in 1872 was part of a delegation who met with U.S. Government officials in Washington, D.C.

The Brulé were one of the seven branches or bands (sometimes called ‘sub-tribes’) of the Teton (Titonwan) Lakota Sioux nation. They are known as Sichá?gu Oyáte (in Lakota), or ‘Burnt Thighs Nation,’ and so were called Brulé (lit. ‘burnt’) by the French.

Photographed by Alexander Gardner of Washington, D.C.

Born in Paisley in Renfrewshire in 1821, Alexander Gardner was a Scottish newspaper editor who became interested in photography when he visited the Great Exhibition in 1851 and saw the photographs of American Mathew Brady. In 1856 he emigrated to the United States, where he established a successful studio in Washington, D.C. He is best remembered for his portraits of Abraham Lincoln (he photographed the President on seven different occasions), his photographs of the American Civil War (some of which were if not quite staged certainly manipulated), and his photographs of the conspirators in the Lincoln assassination plot (he was the only photographer allowed at their hanging). He was also commissioned to photograph Native Americans who came to Washington to discuss treaties. He gave up photography in the early 1870s, helping to found an insurance company instead. He died at his home in Washington, D.C., on 10 December 1882. 

Condition: one of the prints has some small white abrasions at its right-hand edge and some scuff marks in the area of the sitter’s head feather. Apart from that, both prints are in excellent condition, with very good tonal range. They are mounted on sections of crisp, clean card, presumably cut down from album pages. Both mounts have slight abrasion verso along the upper edge where they were mounted with Japanese rice paper in a matte. 

Dimensions: one print measure 6.4” by 3.9” (16.2 cm by 9.9 cm); the mounts measure 7.4” by 4.5” (18.8 cm by 11.4 cm). The other measures 6.5” by 3.8” (16.4 cm by 9.7 cm) with a mount measuring 7.6” by 4.5” (19.2 cm by 11.4 cm).