Huddle's The Surrender of Santa Anna

[Don Guillermo]

It is my understanding that artist William Henry Huddle that painted the famous painting, The Surrender of Santa Anna, extensively researched his scenes as apparently did William McArdle (a friendly competitor) for his works by interviews of first hand witnesses and acquiring documentation as the photographs and portraits of participants (often when many years older) that he integrated into his painting.

Evidence for McArdle’s contacts with individuals is in his archives at UT and presumably his research materials including photographs are there also.

My question is does anyone know the fate of the archival research materials of William Henry Huddle?

Among others over the years on the topic, I recently received an inquiry by a descendant of San Jacinto veteran Thomas Jefferson Jordan of whether there is evidence for an original photograph of him that was used in the Huddle painting. The legend in his family is that he was the one holding the coiled rope on the left side of the painting and is alluded to in the old newspaper article shown in the foregoing link.

A more global question on the Huddle painting--has anyone attempted to identify the participants in the painting beyond the obvious ones? Or to trace Huddle's basis for the collection of individuals that finally ended up in the painting?

Don Guillermo
Sons of DeWitt Colony Texas

[Jim Boylston]

Howdy, Don G, good to see you around!
Here's a link to a site that shows the key for the painting and identifies the figures.
www.tspb.state.tx.us/spb/gallery/hisart/02lgfigure.htm
Jim

[stuart]

Interesting one. Jordan's own service record is obviously quite at odds with the family legend, and he doesn't appear in the painting.

On the wider question of who qualified for inclusion I'd suspect that in more than a few cases it depended who the artist knew. So far as quite a few individuals go you can not only recognise them but the photograph used - Jesse Billingsley is a prime example - and its possible that Huddle simply amassed as many photos of veterans as he could find, which is why a lot of them look rather older than would have been the case in 1836 - our old friend Perry being another good example.

Its also possible that some of them slipped Huddle a little sweetener to ensure that they (or their father/uncle/brother) was prominent. This was certainly the case with similar paintings, such as Benjamin West's magnificent Death of Wolfe, which not only includes individuals who weren't stood around the dying general, but in at least a couple of cases weren't even in Canada at the time!

[sloanrodgers]

Hey Stuart. Not that anyone cared on the other forum, but didn't we
discuss this painting in detail several months ago in the Pirates of the
Carribean thread? I don't believe that there's much that is historical in
this painting. As I recall Mr. Huddle excised a bunch of key figures and
officers who were known to be at the surrender of Santa Anna in favor
of a gaggle of obscure privates. The artist couldn't even get Houston's
wounded foot right.