"A portrait is a picture in which there is just a tiny little something not quite right about the mouth." -- John Singer Sargent

Saturday, February 27, 2016

Osceola



This 1838 portrait of Osceola by George Catlin hangs in the National Portrait Gallery in Washington, DC.
"The Seminole Indians of the Southeast were directly affected by Andrew Jackson's policy of Indian removal, and although a portion of his tribe's leadership gave in to the federal government, Osceola led the resistance. Unlike Black Hawk, who fought the Americans in the West, Osceola did not take on the U.S. military in open battle, but conducted a campaign of guerrilla warfare, harassing federal authorities from the Seminole base in the Everglades. Osceola was captured after the Americans violated a flag of truce. He died in prison shortly thereafter, but the Seminole, famously, never surrendered to the United States." -- National Portrait Gallery
John Sartain produced this engraving of Catlin's painting.

Osceola by George Catlin, engraved by John Sartain

Catlin painted Osceola during his capture at Fort Moultrie. Robert John Curtis painted him in the same period.


This portrait of  Asseola, a Seminole Leader, appeared in Thomas Loraine McKenney, History of Indian Tribes of North America, 1872.


Pe-o-ka

The portrait below known as the Sedgeford Portrait has been widely believed to be a picture of Pocahontas and her son Thomas Rolfe. Modern, 21st century, scholarship has concluded that it is a portrait of Pe-o-ka, one of Osceola's two wives, and their son.


This old postcard (available on E-bay, in 2025) identifies the subjects as Pocahontas and Thomas Rolfe:


Now that the true identity of this mother and child is known, this painting has gained greater historical importance and considerable interest. Historians possess almost no information on Pe-o-ka, and this portrait is the only known image of her. Her story as a widow and a mother is unknown.

See Pe-o-ka's own entry in the Portrait Gallery

Osceola's Grave

 Harper's Encyclopædia has this image of Osceola's Grave at Fort Moultrie, where he was imprisoned and where he died.


OCEOLA
Patriot and Warrior
Died at Fort Moultrie
January 30th 1838.
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