ROCHESTER, N.Y. (AP) — Portraits of John Wilkes Booth and his fellow conspirators in the plot to assassinate President Abraham Lincoln are among prized Civil War images going on display at a museum of photography and film in upstate New York. A four-month exhibition opening Saturday at George Eastman House in Rochester features vintage cameras and 130 framed photographs from the war that began 150 years ago. A warship collection includes one-of-a-kind pictures of the Confederate raider Alabama. Among the museum’s treasures are a retired Union officer’s album illustrating the assassination plot. It contains portraits of nine people implicated in the conspiracy and an albumen print of a famous Alexander Gardner photograph of three men and a woman standing on the gallows as their nooses are adjusted. “What’s unique about the album is the photographs were assembled from many different sources to tell the story of the Lincoln conspiracy,” Alison Nordstrom, the museum’s curator of photographs, said Friday. “It’s a real page-turner, a heart stopper that culminates in the photographs of the hanging.” A facsimile version of the “Between the States” show hits the road in May with stops in Chattanooga, Tenn., Elmhurst, Ill., and Manassas, Va. The museum expects bookings will extend the tour over the next four years as the war’s sesquicentennial is commemorated. The museum owns 1,100 Civil War artifacts and “not only is this material very rare, but it’s very fragile,” Nordstrom said. “Our holdings are recognized as among the best in the world, so when we have the opportunity to show off what we have, we’re anxious to do it.” Lincoln was mortally wounded by Booth at Ford’s Theater in Washington on April 14, 1865, five days after Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee surrendered to end the war. A 12-day manhunt for Booth ended in his death, and eight suspected accomplices in a larger conspiracy intended to rally Confederates were convicted that summer. Four were hanged. Photographic portraiture came into its own during the Civil War era. Lincoln was the first U.S. president to be extensively photographed — more than 125 highly collectible portraits of him survive. “It’s right around the period of the Civil War that having your portrait made photographically became within reach of anyone,” Nordstrom said. “It wasn’t a rich person’s practice anymore. Portraits are by far the most common kind of Civil War period photograph.” More than 400,000 highly valued photographs have been gathered up since 1947 at Eastman House, a landmark Colonial Revival mansion that was home to Kodak founder George Eastman. Until the start of the 20th century, the American Revolution was the nation’s most celebrated historical event, Nordstrom said. “Around 1900, which is actually the beginning of our imperial adventure when we started to get involved in wars far, far away from us, the Civil War became the image of union,” she said. “I do believe the Civil War is the historical lens still by which we understand our country.”
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