Filling Cartridges at the United States Arsenal, at Watertown, Massachusetts

Filling Cartridges at the United States Arsenal, at Watertown, Massachusetts is a powerful wood engraving created by Winslow Homer in 1861. This early work captures a critical moment in American history, documenting the shift in labor dynamics at the outset of the Civil War. As the Union mobilized for conflict, illustrated journalism became the public's primary window into the war effort, establishing Homer as a leading reportorial artist.

The print depicts women engaged in essential, often dangerous, war work: the assembly of ammunition cartridges at the Watertown Arsenal. Homer focuses on the concentrated effort of the workers, using the stark contrasts characteristic of the wood engraving medium to emphasize the mechanical and urgent nature of their task. This imagery provided the public with a rare glimpse into the vital mobilization happening on the home front, underscoring the crucial, and largely unrecognized, contribution of women to the United States military support structure.

As a detailed print, this work exemplifies the primary method of reproducing images for mass circulation in the mid-19th century, often appearing in publications like Harper's Weekly. The high quality and immediacy of the work solidified Homer’s reputation as a masterful graphic artist before he turned primarily to oil painting later in his career. This historical record of American ingenuity and labor, classified as a Print, forms part of the distinguished collection of the Cleveland Museum of Art, and reproductions of the work are frequently available through public domain sources.