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Congress Noting Independence the Trumbull and T^In E-Savage Tpaintings

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Congress Noting Independence the Trumbull and T^In E-Savage Tpaintings Congress Noting Independence The Trumbull and T^in e-Savage TPaintings EITHER the aesthetic values nor the accuracy with which the event or characters are portrayed in the Trumbull and N Pine-Savage paintings of Congress voting independence is of prime importance in this investigation of the authenticity with which the Assembly Room of Independence Hall has been pictured. Briefly, we want to determine which painting more accurately pre- sents the furnishings and accessories and the architectural detail of the Assembly Room as it was in 1775-1787.1 Let us first examine the reliability of Colonel John Trumbull's "Declaration of Independence."2 When John Trumbull conceived the idea of painting a series of historical pictures to preserve the great moments of the American Revolution, conditions were nearly ideal for such an undertaking. Many of the participants were still vigor- ously alive. Trumbull himself had participated in the war. He had been appointed an aide-de-camp to Washington in 17753; later, as deputy adjutant general, he had been with General Gates at Ticon- deroga.4 His acquaintance with the prominent figures of the day was wide. As the son of the legendary "Brother Jonathan," Revolution- ary governor of Connecticut, he had a claim on the affections of all patriots. His eldest brother, Joseph, was the commissary general,5 1 This investigation was undertaken as part of the research program at Independence National Historical Park, Philadelphia. Its immediate aim was to determine whether either painting could be used to help interpret the documentary evidence relating to the furnishings, accessories, and architectural detail of the Assembly Room. 2 Trumbull painted three versions of the "Declaration of Independence": the small original at the Yale Gallery, the life-size one in the rotunda of the Capitol in Washington, and a third, half life-size, at the Wadsworth Athenaeum, Hartford, Conn. Except where the variations in these three paintings become pertinent to the discussion, no attempt will be made to differ- entiate between them. 3 Theodore Sizer, ed., The Autobiography of Colonel John Trumbull (New Haven, Conn., 1953), 22. ±Ibid.y 26. 5 Ibid., 21. 74 1956 CONGRESS VOTING INDEPENDENCE 75 while another brother, Jonathan, served as "pay master of the forces for the New York department/' as a secretary to Washington and as a member of the first, second, and third Congresses under the new Constitution.6 Thus, John Trumbull by his personal and family asso- ciations was in a position to know and understand the events he wished to portray. Furthermore, Trumbull was no mere craftsman. He was a man of broad cultural background, the recipient of a degree from Harvard,7 and later the vice-president of the New-York His- torical Society.8 He seems to have embodied the ideal qualities of a historian whose chosen medium was paint and canvas. In London, under the tutelage of Benjamin West, Trumbull painted the "Battle of Bunker's Hill" and the "Death of Gen. Montgomery in the Attack on Quebec." By the time both pictures were finished in 1786, Trumbull was embarked on a forty-year course of triumphs and disasters in his attempt to create a pictorial history of the American Revolution. These first two paintings of the series were certainly shown to Jefferson, and probably to John Adams. It was with the aid of Adams and Jefferson that Trumbull selected the other subjects for his series, including the "Declaration of Inde- pendence," which purports to show the Assembly Room of the State House of Pennsylvania in 1776. Is the Trumbull painting a true and accurate picture of the Assembly Room in July, 1776? There is no record that Trumbull saw the room during the Revolutionary period. While his autobiography places him in Pennsylvania briefly in 1776, it does not specifically mention that he visited Philadelphia. In Trumbull's own words, "We . crossed the Delaware at Easton, and marched through Bethlehem to Newtown, where we joined the commander in chief, a few days before his glorious success at Trenton. News had just been received by him, that a detachment of the enemy had obtained pos- session of Newport and Rhode Island, and General Arnold and my- self were ordered to hasten without delay to that quarter."9 Indeed, there is no evidence to place Trumbull in Philadelphia before 1790, for his autobiography makes it quite clear that he confined his subse- 6 Ibid., 163 (note 5); Douglas Southall Freeman, George Washington (New York, 1952), V, 283. 7Sizer, 11. 8/**/., 355. 9"Ibid., 35. y6 JAMES M. MULCAHY January quent activities to New England until his departure for London in May, 1780. Since 1790 is the earliest that Trumbull could have seen the room, it is necessary to determine whether he painted it into his composi- tion prior to 1790. This seems to be the case, for the painting, begun in 1785, must have been fairly complete by 1790. In November, 1786, Trumbull wrote: "I returned to London [from the Continent^ ... I resumed my labors, however, and . arranged carefully the com- position of the Declaration of Independence, and prepared it for receiving the portraits, as I might meet the distinguished men, who were present at that illustrious scene."10 In view of this statement and recalling that the first two paintings in the series were finished in less than two years, it seems probable that Trumbull had completed the "Declaration of Independence" except for the portrait heads. This viewpoint is further supported by his painting in Jefferson and Adams before leaving Europe for New York. There remains, of course, the possibility that Trumbull altered details of his background during his stay in Philadelphia in 1790, or during his winter visits of 1792 and 1793,11 when he would have had ample opportunity to see the Assembly Room and make such altera- tions as he thought advisable. However, the similarity of the small original at Yale and the compositional sketch and floor plan done in France in 1786 by Trumbull and Jefferson respectively seems to prove that Trumbull made no alterations in his original painting. It seems unlikely that he would be inclined to change the details of the room, since he wrote to Adams in December, 1817: "I preserve faithfully the costume of the day and the architecture of the room, which I very much regret to find has lately been destroyed by that restless spirit of Change, which so much prevails in this country."12 As there is no recorded visit of Trumbull to Philadelphia between the winter of 1793 and 1817, and since he was out of the country much of the 10 Ibid., 146-147. 11 His autobiography places him there in May, 1790 (p. 165), and Jacob Hiltzheimer records that on Dec. 18, 1790, "Mr. John Trumbull breakfasted with me at my house." Jacob Cox Parsons, ed., Diary of Jacob Hiltzheimer (Philadelphia, 1893), 165. Further, a newspaper article by Trumbull in the New York Daily Advertiser, Oct. 22, 1818, states that he spent the winters of 1792 and 1793 in Philadelphia. 12 Trumbull Letter Book, Dec. 16, 1717, as quoted by John Hill Morgan, Paintings by John Trumbull at Yale University (New Haven, Conn., 1926). 1956 CONGRESS VOTING INDEPENDENCE 77 time, it seems probable that "lately" referred to the visits of the early I79o's, and thus to the work done on the State House during the 1777-1790 period but before the really extensive changes which later followed. At any rate, if Trumbull was referring to the room of 1790 or of 1817, it is unlikely that he would have thought the details of a room which had suffered from "the restless spirit of Change" merited much consideration. Since it is unlikely that Trumbull painted even the altered Assem- bly Room from life, what were the sources of his picture? Speaking of his visit with Jefferson, Trumbull states that "during my visit, I began the composition of the Declaration of Independence, with the assistance of his information and advice."13 At the Yale Gallery there is a sketch, already referred to, endorsed apparently in Trum- bull's handwriting, and consisting of two parts: a pencil sketch by Trumbull labeled "first idea of the Declaration of Independence, Paris, Sept. 1786," and an ink sketch by Thomas Jefferson, "done by Mr. Jefferson to convey an idea of the Room in which congress sat." The compositional sketch is very like the finished painting. There are two other similar sketches, both in the archives of The Historical Society of Pennsylvania, dated by Theodore Sizer as 1790. From their similarity to the 1786 sketch, it is possible that they may well have been done before 1790. Be that as it may, from a floor plan drawn from memory by Jefferson and from whatever verbal descrip- tion may have been added, Trumbull composed his picture. It is well to remember that both Jefferson and Trumbull had architectural interests and talents. Trumbull is credited with building a meeting- house in New Lebanon, Connecticut, the First Presbyterian Church in Philadelphia, and the Gallery at Yale University. Indeed, Edmund Burke, on the occasion of Trumbull's second visit to England, ad- vised the young painter to adopt architecture as a profession.14 Trumbull was certainly in a position to interpret Jefferson's diagram more readily than the average painter. An apparently ideal situation thus existed for producing a picture of the Assembly Room through the collaboration of two men, both with architectural knowledge, one of them having seen the room time and time again at the period of its greatest importance, the 13 Sizer, 93.
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