Manet, the USS Kearsage and CSS Alabama

My wife took me to the Manet/Degas exhibit at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. It was excellent. Of course, I noted Manet's paintings of the Kearsage-Alabama fight and the painting of the Kearsage at anchor. I thought it should be shared with you.

The CSS Alabama was a screw sloop-of-war built along the River Mersey near Liverpool by John Laird Sons and Company. British built, it had a British crew and Confederate officers who had made their way across the Atlantic. Between summer of 1862 and Spring of 1864 it captured 65 Union merchant ships, decimating the Union whaling fleet. It then met the USS Kearsage, a Union sloop-of-war off the coast of France. The US Navy ship proved a tougher customer than the merchant ships. The Alabama sank.

Manet's painting features the stricken Alabama in the center, with the Kearsage nearly enveloped in smoke behind. Many French spectators watched the battle.

 

Manet later saw the Kearsage at anchor and painted it. It looks formidable, all business. 

After the American Civil War ended, President Grant's administration pressed claims against Great Britain for the damage done by the Alabama and other British-built raiders. International Arbitration found for the US and the British paid $15.5 million, leading to a treaty that restored relations between the two nations. It also set a precedent for international arbitration.