In 1868, celebrated Civil War photographer Alexander Gardner posed six federal peace commissioners with a young Native girl. Though the hand-labeled prints carefully name each of the men, the girl is never identified. Through extensive research, Martha A. Sandweiss (The Girl in the Middle: A Recovered History of the American West) identifies Sophie Mousseau, the Native girl, and reveals how the American nation grappled with what kind of country it would be as it expanded westward in the aftermath of the Civil War.
Photo Credit: Janet Russek
Martha A. Sandweiss is professor emerita of history at Princeton University, where she is founding director of the Princeton & Slavery Project. She is the award-winning author of many books, including Passing Strange: A Gilded Age Tale of Love and Deception across the Color Line and Print the Legend: Photography and the American West. Her latest book is The Girl in the Middle: A Recovered History of the American West.
