American Art Collaborative

Melodramatic tales of scalping were popular in Europe and the United States throughout the nineteenth century. John Mix Stanley’s operatic scene shows a villain wielding a war club over a desperate woman's head. A hero who wears a presidential peace medal blocks the club with his spear. By the time Stanley painted this canvas, the government had already begun to subdue native peoples by relocating tribes and fostering warfare among them. This "divide and conquer" policy, together with thrilling narratives of white captives carried off to slavery, helped ease the consciences of European Americans making their way across the continent. Stanley based this fictional image on sketches he made while traveling through the frontier territories in 1842 and 1843.

Exhibition Label, Smithsonian American Art Museum, 2006