Battle on the Platte Bridge

Watercolor painting on paper "Battle on the Platte Bridge" by William Henry "W.H." Jackson. The landscape consists of a grassy area on which there are barracks, or a fort and tipis in the foreground. A river runs across the middle ground with a bridge. The background is lined cavalry on horseback before mountains.

William Henry "W.H." Jackson (1843-1942) was a self taught artist and photographer. He took the first images of Yellowstone in 1871 and of Jackson Lake, Wyoming in 1878. Official photographer for Geological Survey 1871. Painting was his passion from a very young age. By age 19 he had become a skillful, talented artist of American pre-Civil-War Visual Arts. He was a great-great nephew of Samuel Wilson, the progenitor of America's national symbol Uncle Sam.[