North Carolina Emigrants: Poor White Folks
Completed in 1845, James Henry Beard’s (1811–1893) painting depicts a family moving north to Ohio. Unlike many optimistic scenes of emigration, the picture conveys a sense of resigned despair. The family members, led by a sullen, disheveled father, pause at a water trough while their cow drinks and their dog chews a bone. The mother looks apprehensively toward the future as she cradles a child; two barefoot older children listlessly await their father’s command. New York writer Charles Briggs interpreted the painting as an “eloquent sermon on Anti-Slavery … , the blight of Slavery has paralyzed the strong arm of the man and destroyed the spirit of the woman.” Although primarily a portrait painter, Beard questioned the ethics and optimism of American culture in Ohio Land Speculator (1840) and The Last Victim of the Deluge (1849), as well as in Poor White Folks. Cincinnati Art Museum, Ohio, USA/Gift of the Proctor & Gamble Company/The Bridgeman Art Library.