Finding a treasure

RAPID CITY – When a friend of Rapid City resident Sharon Brave came across a print of a painting by Edgar Samuel Paxson titled, “Custer’s Last Stand” she knew she had come across something valuable.

While driving through a high end part of a town in California, her friend spotted the print outside the estate of an older man that had passed. His children had placed much of his belongings outside along the street.

It’s not often that one finds a valuable print like this so her friend immediately snatched it up and drove away with it.

Brave said her friend knew she would appreciate the “Custer’s Last Stand” print so her friend gifted it to her as a birthday present. Only by researching the history of the creation of this epic painting can one truly appreciate the value of the print.

Edgar Samuel Paxson, born in East Hamborg, New York in 1852, was the son of a carriage maker. Some believe that experience gained from painting carriages would lead to his career as one of great western frontier artists that preserved through artography the Wild West.

Paxson was the contemporary of other great western artists such as Charles Russell and Frederick Remington, but his work was considered a more realistic and true to life depiction of the western frontier.

The print is a reproduction of what is considered one of Edgar Samual Paxson’s greatest artistic accomplishments. Although Paxson is best known for his portraits of Native Americans during the 1800’s, his depiction of the Battle of the Little Big Horn is deemed “the best pictorial representation of the battle,” and “from a purely artistic standpoint… one of the best if not the finest pictures which have been created to immortalize that dramatic event.”

Just by considering its sheer size, six feet by ten feet, can one begin to appreciate the enormity of this undertaking, which took him more than 20 years to complete.

In a biography about his great grandfather William Paxson quoted the elder Paxson, “When Custer and his brave command met their fate on the Little Big Horn, I said, ‘Some time I will paint that scene’ during my leisure hours. I kept dabbling with brush. Each day I saw some improvement. In all this time, I never lost view of my object, and for 20 years gathered data, sifted and resifted it, conversed with participants on either side, visited the scene and became as familiar with the ground and the circumstances as with my own home.”

Paxson’s research would lead to interviews with Chief Gall, Chief Rain in the Face, the Cheyenne warrior Two Moons and the Chief he called the “most cunning and incorrigible hostile of them all” Chief Tantanka Iyotaka (Sitting Bull). He is also said to have interviewed Brigadier General Edward Settle Godfrey who was from Benteen’s force and was one of the first to witness the scene after the battle, as well as interviews with 96 other soldiers from related campaigns.

From these interviews he created a detailed journal about their equipment, clothing and the actual location of each man in the battlefield. He also drew individual scaled down versions of 25 of the figures in the battle including; 1. Gen. Custer, 2. Rain in the Face, 3. Chief Gall, 4. Chief Spotted Eagle, 5. Chief Two Moons, 6. Chief White Bull, 7. Guidon – Troop C, 8. Capt. G.W. Yates, 9. Dying Trumpeter, 10. Sgt. Reilly – Standard Bearer, 11. Chief Hump, 12. Half Breed Scout – Jim Bouyer, 13, Dead Sioux Chief, 14, Chief Crow King, 15. Lieut. W. Van W. Riley, 16. Lieut. A.E. Smith, 17. Lieut. J.E. Porter, 18. Wounded Indian War Pony, 19. Capt. T.W. Custer (Gen. Custer’s brother), 20. Adjt. W.W. Cook, 21. White Scout, 22. Lieut. Jas Calhoun, 23. Chief Crazy Horse, 24. First Sgt. Kenney – Troop F, 25. Wounded Soldier extracting cartridge shell with a pocket knife.

The painting which Paxson probably began in 1895 includes more than two hundred figures and is considered to be the most accurate depiction of General George Armstrong Custer on the battlefield. Most artists paint Custer holding up a saber, but according to historians the 7^th Cavalry was not equipped with sabers and instead used rifles and pistols. Paxson, during his lifetime also painted portraits of six surviving Chiefs of the battle. He also studied army and family photographs of the soldiers so as to replicate an accurate portrayal of those who died on the battlefield.

Paxson’s original painting of “Custer’s Last Stand” can now be found in the Whitney Gallery of Western Art at the Buffalo Bills Center of the West in Cody, Wyoming.

Now that Sharon Brave, a member of the Yankton Sioux Tribe, has come into possession of the print signed by the great-grandson of Edgar S. Paxson, William Paxson she has become interested in the value of this truly remarkable find. If anyone is interested in purchasing the signed print, please contact Sharon Brave at 605-343-5523.

(Contact Ernestine Anunkasan Hupa at editor@nativesunnews.today)

The post Finding a treasure first appeared on Native Sun News Today.

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