Large Format Photo Showing The Trustees of the Peabody Education Fund for the Southern States

Albumen print, 9 1/8 x 18 1/4 inches; mount larger, Brady's printed title, credit, identifications, and date mount recto.

George Peabody gave two million dollars following the Civil War to establish the Peabody Education Fund, which supported education in the eleven former Confederate states and West Virginia. "Peabody's chief contribution in 1867 was the allocation of $3.5 million for the establishment of the Peabody Education Fund. This fund was primarily intended to advance education in the South and to ameliorate relations in America after the Civil War. Monies from this fund were used to support southern tax-supported schools, to aid black colleges in the South, and to establish the George Peabody College for Teachers and other normal schools in southern states. Like the United States, Britain received a large contribution from Peabody. The Peabody Donation, established in 1862 and later called the Peabody Trust, amounted to $2.5 million. Its funds were intended to provide low rent and comfortable housing for poor working-class families in London." - ANB. Since the fund's rules prohibited the establishment of new schools, the benefit for African-Americans was limited.

Mathew Brady photographed the trustees of the fund in their second meeting in New York City, three months after the fund's establishment. Standing, left to right: G.W. Riggs, D.C., G.N. Eaton, Maryland, W.M. Evarts, New York., E.A. Bradford, Louisiana, C. Macalister, Pennsylvania, Admiral David G. Farragut; Governor Hamilton Fish, New York; General Ulysses S. Grant; Governor William Aiken, South Carolina; Bishop Charles P. McIlvaine, Ohio; and Samuel Wetmore, New York. Seated in front are G.P. Russell, Massachusetts, W.A. Graham, North Carolina, J.H. Clifford, Massachusetts., George Peabody, Robert C. Winthrop, Massachusetts