This watercolor with pencil shading was done by Samuel J. Reader of Indianola, Kansas. The painting depicts Confederate soldiers marching Union prisoners of war while a haystack burns in the background. The artist was an eyewitness to the scene, having been captured with other members of the Second Kansas Militia following General Sterling Price's Raid into Kansas. The Price Raid was a multi-day running battle that happened very near the Kansas-Missouri border in the fall of 1864. Samuel Reader was Quartermaster for the Second Kansas during the raid's Battle of the Big Blue on October 22, where Union forces were routed. The prisoners later were marched to Tyler, Texas. Reader escaped by tricking his captors into believing he was a Confederate soldier. A four-day walk brought him home to Indianola, just north of Topeka, where he recorded his adventures in a journal.

Creator: Reader, Samuel James
Date: 1865