Harper's Weekly — Gen. Burnside Cover, "The Life of a Spy" Engraving, "Honor the Brave" Centerfold

About Harper's Weekly: Harper's Weekly was a political magazine published in New York City from 1857 to 1916, and was the most widely read journal in the United States during the American Civil War. It covered a wide variety of topics, ranging from foreign and domestic news to fiction and humorous essays. Harper's Weekly had a strong influence on history due to it's high readership, with an example being on the issue of slavery. Though the magazine initially took a moderate stance on slavery prior to the Civil War so not to offend its large Southern audience, it became staunchly pro-Union and abolition after the war began. Famously, it published an engraving showing the scarred back of Gordon, an escaped slave who joined up to fight in the Union army (a dubious claim by the magazine that may have conflated two different stories). Regardless, the images served as a first look into the true brutalities of slavery for many Northerners and encouraged free Black men in the North to enlist.