Gettysburg Off the Beaten Path: Confederate Prisoners Photograph Location

It’s one of the most iconic images of the American Civil War: Three Confederate prisoners, clad in butternut and gray, pose for a photograph by Mathew Brady after the battle of Gettysburg.

Famously featured in Ken Burns’s documentary The Civil War, this photograph has appeared in countless magazines, monographs, and media. Historian Shelby Foote memorably recounts the historical importance of the photo, for it is one of the only pieces of photographic evidence that shows Gen. Robert E. Lee’s army in the field. However, the precise location of this photograph remained a mystery for decades. That was the case until William Frassanito published his seminal book Gettysburg: A Journey in Time, which correctly identifies the location of the photo as Seminary Ridge.

Frassanito skillfully compared the background of the photograph with others taken by Mathew Brady on July 15, 1863. Key to his analysis was the “mammoth tree” that once towered over Cemetery Hill.[1] This tree is unmistakably visible over the right shoulder of the left Confederate prisoner. It is also visible in Brady’s view of the town of Gettysburg captured on the same day just a few yards to the north of where the prisoners stood. The site of the photograph makes sense because Brady undoubtedly took at least two other photographs on Seminary Ridge that day (the aforementioned one of the town and one of Lee’s headquarters), as well as a handful of photographs on nearby McPherson Ridge.

The location is further corroborated by the presence of a large barricade, upon which the Confederate prisoners lean, that was constructed by Union troops on July 1. As Brig. Gen. John C. Robinson’s division arrived on the field early that morning, they began dismantling rail fences and piling them up on Seminary Ridge as the Iron Brigade fought the Rebels on the next ridge over.

Later that day, I Corps troops huddled behind the barricade for a final stand against Confederates under Maj. Gen. Dorsey Pender before the Union retreat through town. Soldiers of Lt. Gen. A.P. Hill’s corps likely maintained and added to the barricade as they occupied Seminary Ridge for the next three days.[2] The structure stood until at least July 15, the day Brady arrived in Gettysburg to capture his photograph. The barricade, which features prominently in Brady’s photo, is clearly made of fence rails.

Despite the discovery of the photograph’s precise location, several mysteries continue to plague this famous image. Historians have long speculated on the identity of the three Confederate prisoners captured by Brady, but no conclusive evidence has ever been found. They are merely a handful of nearly 5,000 Rebel prisoners taken into Union hands during the battle.

Another peculiarity of the photograph is the fact that Confederate prisoners remained on the Gettysburg battlefield eleven days after the armies departed. Frassanito addresses this question in his book, speculating that the prisoners might have been stragglers taken into Federal custody along Lee’s retreat route in the weeks after the battle. He also notes that about 2,500 captured Confederates were transferred from Gettysburg to Washington, D.C. on July 16.[3] Perhaps Brady encountered these men as they waited to begin their journey to a Northern prison camp the next day. Other historians have speculated that the three Confederates might have served as nurses at the nearby Seminary hospital or in a burial detail.

Also noteworthy is the lack of Union guards in the photograph. Frassanito posits that a Federal soldier might be standing just out of the frame, closely watching as Brady captured the three prisoners. But other historians suggest that the absence of a guard may suggest these Confederates had already taken the Oath of Allegiance, as several prisoners had done in the weeks after the battle of Gettysburg.[4]

The soldiers’ identities or occupations will likely never be known, but their importance in representing what Lee’s men looked like in the summer of 1863 remains uncontested.

To Reach the photograph location:

From the town square.

– Drive east on Chambersburg Street.
– Follow Chambersburg Street until it becomes Buford Ave.
– Make a left onto Seminary Ridge Drive.
– A small stone wall marks the photograph location immediately to your left.

Notes:

[1] William Frassanito, Gettysburg: A Journey in Time, (Gettysburg, PA: Thomas Publications, 1975), 71.

[2] Harry W. Pfanz, Gettysburg: The First Day, (Chapel Hill, NC: University of North Carolina Press, 2001), 311.

[3] Frassanito, Gettysburg: A Journey in Time, 71.

[4] Paul Russinoff, “Three Confederate Prisoners at Gettysburg: Exploring a theory that they were nurses who signed the Oath of Allegiance,” Military Images Digital, published June 4, 2024, accessed June 23, 2025, https://www.militaryimagesmagazine-digital.com/2024/06/04/three-confederate-prisoners-at-gettysburg-exploring-a-theory-that-they-were-nurses-who-signed-the-oath-of-allegiance/.