American Historical Ephemera and Photography

CDV on cardstock mount (light toning, light wear to mount edges). Inscribed in red ink to recto: "Contr. Photo. 749," and "Ruoss, 7th N York." Verso bears ink identification: "Geo. Ruass [sic]."

Most likely captured by William H. Bell, a veteran of the Civil War himself, who became chief photographer of the Army Medical Museum in Washington. He captured images of injured soldiers like the one featured here, in order to document the types of wounds and associated diseases suffered by veterans. This portrait features a wounded soldier, holding himself up in a standing position with the use of a studio prop behind him. He is unclothed below the waist, for the purpose of showing the effects of his wound and the possible onset of osteomyelitis.

George Ruoss (listed in New York State records as "Roos") enlisted as a private on 10 September 1864, mustering into Company G of the 7th New York Veteran Infantry Regiment that same day. He is listed as being wounded, though the date and place are not stated in the record. Other sources note that he was hit with a conoidal musket ball at the South Side Railroad near Petersburg, VA on 31 March 1865. The ball "struck the anterior and outer aspect of the right thigh...comminuting portions of the upper and middle thirds of the femur, and passed out posteriorly about the middle of the gluteal fold." (The Waking Dream: Photography's First Century. Selections from the Gilman Paper Company Collection. New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1993.)