Harper's stressed that Winslow Homer "drew his figures from life." The writer continued, "It is notorious to military men that soldiers seldom actually cross bayonets with each other in battle. . . . At Fair Oaks the rebels almost invariably broke and fled before our bayonets reached them. In one or two instances, however, there were hand-to-hand tussles. . . . One of these is realized in our picture."
Fair Oaks refers to Virginia's Battle of Seven Pines (May 31- June 1, 1862). The Confederates tried to push McClellan further back from their capital of Richmond but the fight was bloody and inconclusive.
Details