Individuals >> Marshall, William Edgar (1837-1906)

Artist.

In the obituary of Charles Pfaff, William Edgar Marshall is described as one of the “Knights of the Round Table” of the “lions of Bohemia” (“In and about the City” 2). Marshall is best known for his work as an engraver and portrait painter. In 1858 he was given a rare opportunity to work for the American Bank Note Company, where he spent “several years and became one of its best engravers” (Hartt). He moved to Paris in 1863 to study painting, but “news of the assassination of Lincoln brought him home to paint, from photographs and descriptions, a portrait of the martyred President” (Hartt). Following the completion of the portrait, he traveled to Boston where he painted Emerson, Hawthorne, and Longfellow, among others.

Marshall set up his New York studio in 1866. His home became a popular haunt for artists and writers of the day, including Georges Clemenceau, due in large part to the fact Marshall “had an engaging, humorous personality and in conversation could draw from a wealth of entertaining anecdotes concerning his famous sitters” (Hartt).

References & Biographical Resources

Baldensperger, Fernand. "Introduction." American Reconstruction: 1865-1870. New York: Da Capo Press, 1969. 13-31. [more about this work]

Baldensperger mentions Clemenceau's friendship with Marshall. He notes that the two had met in France and became reaquainted in New York (18). [pages: 18]

Hartt, Mary Bronson. "William Edgar Marshall." Dictionary of American Biography. Base Set. American Council of Learned Societies, 1928-1936. Reproduced in Biography Resource Center. Farmington Hills, Mich.: Thomson Gale, 2006. http://www.galenet.com/servlet/BioRC. [more about this work]

"In and about the City: Death of Charles I. Pfaff. Something about the Proprietor of the Once Famous "Bohemia."." New York Times. 26 Apr. 1890: 2. [more about this work]

The obituary identifies him as one of the "Knights of the Round Table" of the "lions of Bohemia." [pages: 2]

Wilson, James Grant and John Fiske, eds. Appletons' Cyclopaedia of American Biography, Volume IV, Lodge-Pickens. New York: D. Appleton & Co., 1888. [more about this work]

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