John Trumbull: The man who painted the Revolution from life

The cover image of “Glorious Lessons” includes a self-portrait by John Trumbull, 1802.  Courtesy of Yale University Press

By JOYCE CORRIGAN

A strikingly handsome and connected young man gets shot at, jailed as a suspected spy, and becomes entangled in extramarital affairs. Through it all, John Trumbull, Revolutionary War veteran, and son of the only colonial royal governor to embrace the Patriot cause, also manages a young wife with a drinking problem, an illegitimate son who joins the British Army, a solid place on the “A” list in American and European society — and a career as one of the most respected and influential  painters of the American Revolution. 

For a young nation, there were a remarkable number of outstanding artists — Benjamin West, Gilbert Stuart, John Singleton Copley — but unlike them, Trumbull didn’t just paint the revolution, he lived it. 

If Trumbull’s own life is cinematic, it is certainly matched in drama by his extraordinary paintings, believed the author and journalist, Richard Brookhiser. Brookhiser will discuss his new book, “Glorious Lessons: John Trumbull, Painter of the American Revolution” Tuesday, May 6, at 7 p.m., at the Bedford Playhouse, presented by the John Jay Homestead Lecture Series. 

“John Jay 1745-1829,” a 1794 portrait by John Trumbull. Courtesy of New York State Office of Parks, Recreation and Historic Preservation

The author of biographies of James Madison, George Washington and Abraham Lincoln, Brookhiser was awarded the National Humanities Medal in 2008 by President George W. Bush.

An aide-de-camp to Washington during the war, and secretary to John Jay during the signing of the highly contentious Jay Treaty, Trumbull saw painting as his personal patriotic duty.

“The most powerful motive I have,” he wrote in a 1789 letter to Jefferson “was to [commemorate] the great Events of our Country’s Revolution … and to give to the present and the future Sons of Oppression and Misfortune such glorious Lessons of their rights and the Spirit with which they should assert and support them.” 

Trumble even humblebrags a bit, about the “superiority” of his eyewitness status, which “arose from my having borne personally a part in the great Events which I was to describe.” 

Son of Connecticut Gov. Jonathan Trumbull, the young patriot met everyone who was anyone in those turbulent times, from politicians and monarchs to master artists.

Brookhiser first came under the spell of Trumbull’s historic paintings as an undergraduate at Yale University. Trumbull, in fact, founded the Yale University Art Gallery in 1832, the country’s first college art museum. 

“Generations before photography and film, Trumbull’s renderings made you feel as if you were actually there,” Brookhiser said. “There’s darkness and death, smoke and panic. He’s not capturing an instant but recreating the whole heroic event.” 

“The Death of General Warren at the Battle of Bunker’s Hill, June 17, 1775” depicts the moment when American Maj. Gen. Joseph Warren is mortally wounded by a musket ball, just as the British successfully advance. The great Benjamin West declared Trumbull’s canvas “the best picture of a modern battle,” while Abigail Adams exclaimed, “To speak of its merit I can only say that in looking at it my whole frame contracted, my blood shivered, and I felt a faintness at my heart.” 

Worth a good look, too, Brookhiser suggested, is “The Resignation of General Washington, December 23, 1783.” 

“Note the clothing,” he said, “out of the large group of patriots, only Washington is in military garb.” 

Washington’s gesture symbolized the gracious transition of military power back to the people, back to civilian control — a key principle of American democracy. 

“Glimpsed quickly, the Yale installation of Trumbull’s historic canvases taken together seems like a movie trailer,” recalled Brookhiser. “But studied slowly, it was Trumbull presenting the whole film of the Revolution. He made a point of including patriotic women, African Americans and Native Americans — he painted the creation story of America.”

Understandably, some of Trumbull’s life didn’t make it onto a canvas. He never painted his time in a London prison (Benjamin West’s intervention with George III got Trumbull freed and not hanged), or scenes of Jefferson’s love life in London when Trumbull was acting as a go-between for the future president and the much-married English artist Maria Cosway. That said, Jefferson did recommend that Trumbull take on what would become his masterpiece. Located in the rotunda of the U.S. Capitol is his monumental “Declaration of Independence” (1818) covering 216 square feet. “Probably no coincidence,” offered Brookhiser, that Jefferson is front and center of the canvas.

On a much more intimate scale is the 1793 portrait of a 58-year-old John Jay, created during his mission to England to negotiate the Jay Treaty.

“The Trumbull painting is the only Jay portrait in our collection that he sat for himself,” said Melissa Vail, vice president of the Friends of John Jay Homestead. “For that reason alone, it’s regarded as one of the family’s real treasures. And since so many of Trumbull’s contemporaries praised him for his accuracy, it’s safe to say it’s a very good likeness.” 

“There is maybe a touch of sadness there,” Brookhiser said about the Jay portrait. Here is the famously reserved Jay unsmiling, dignified, and balding. Like several founders, he refused to wear wigs, thinking them symbols of European decadence. 

As a condition of his sale of paintings to the Yale University Art Gallery, Trumbull and his wife were assured burial beneath the renowned museum, where they remain, forever linking his grand life with his glorious artistic legacy.

Bedford Playhouse is located at 633 Old Post Road, Bedford. For tickets and more information, visit bedfordplayhouse.org.