Alfred Rudolph Waud (pronounced
Wood) was an English born artist and illustrator, most notable for the sketches
he made as an artist correspondent during the Civil War when all images in a
publication had to be hand drawn and engraved by skilled artists. Photography
existed but there was no way to transfer a photograph to a printing plate at
the time.
In 1860, Alfred Waud became an
illustrator for the New York Illustrated News and was assigned to follow the
Army of the Potomac into battle. Alfred Waud attended every battle of the Army
of the Potomac between the First Battle of Bull Run in 1861 and the Siege of
Petersburg in 1865. Waud died in 1891 in
Marietta, Georgia, while touring battlefields of the South.