Michael Lehr Antiques
Live Auction

Fall Photographic History Auction, 2025

Sat, Sep 6, 2025 01:00PM EDT
  2025-09-06 13:00:00 2025-09-06 13:00:00 America/New_York Michael Lehr Michael Lehr : Fall Photographic History Auction, 2025 https://auction.michaellehrantiques.com/auctions/michael-lehr-antiques/fall-photographic-history-auction-2025-20189
We are pleased to announce our next auction, featuring approximately 200 individual lots drawn from a diverse and compelling range of 19th- and early 20th-century photography. This sale focuses on vernacular images, photographs created not as formal studio portraits or elite commissions, but as direct, unscripted records of lived experience. These are objects made by and for everyday people, preserving moments of intimacy, labor, travel, performance, identity, and loss.
Michael Lehr Antiques info@michaellehrantiques.com
Lot 143

Framed Civil War Albumen of Lieutenant John Wolcott Hubbell

Estimate: $200 - $300
Starting Bid
$100

Bid Increments

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Exceptional Civil War-era oval albumen portrait of Lieutenant John Wolcott Hubbell in uniform, housed in its original period frame and mount. The officer is shown seated with full epaulettes, dress frock coat, sword belt plate, and gloves, one hand resting on his saber and the other near a plumed officer’s shako with crossed sabers insignia visible. His direct and confident gaze, together with the sharp focus and tone, conveys a formal yet intimate record of a Union officer during the American conflict.

A period paper label affixed to the reverse identifies the sitter as “John Wolcott Hubbell, son of Julius Caesar Hubbell and Anna Moore.” Extensive genealogical records trace Hubbell’s New York roots, and he appears to have served in the Union Army during the Civil War. The portrait likely dates from the early 1860s and may have been produced shortly after his commission. Framed and preserved in an appealing 19th-century black-painted wooden frame with original backing and paper label.

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