Henry Lewis

Henry Lewis was a nineteenth-century painter who for a time worked in St. Louis, Misssouri. His most famous work was an extensive panorama of the Mississippi River, from St. Anthony Falls in Minnesota to New Orleans.

Lewis immigrated to America in 1829, first living in Boston, Massachusetts, where he apprenticed as a carpenter and mechanic. In 1836, he relocated to St. Louis with his father. Lewis worked as a carpenter and scene painter for the Ben De Bar Opera House.

Lewis was a self-taught painter, and by 1845, he was established as an artist and was recognized by the local newspapers as a landscape painter. From 1845 to 1847, Lewis shared a studio with portrait painter James F. Wilkins. Around this time, Lewis began planning to create a large-scale panorama of the length of the Mississippi River. A panorama was a popular art form and entertainment in the mid-nineteenth century. This type of painting was a large-scale canvas painted with scenery that was unrolled before an audience to give an illusion of movement, with accompanying narration and music. 

Lewis claimed to have the idea for the Mississippi panorama first, but there were other artists associated with St. Louis who made competing panoramas. (Schmitz, “Henry Lewis,” 39). To prepare for his panorama, Lewis traveled on the upper Mississippi by boat in the summers of 1846 to 1848, sketching scenery along the shoreline on both sides of the river. Lewis hired artist Charles Rogers to sketch scenes of the lower Mississippi River, from St. Louis to the Gulf of Mexico, for inclusion in the panorama. Lewis also purchased 79 sketches from Fort Snelling artist Seth Eastman of scenes of the upper Mississippi. Lewis used these sketches as a source for the design of his panorama. (Schmitz, “Henry Lewis,” 40).

In 1848, Lewis began painting his panorama. At the beginning, he was assisted by St. Louis artist Leon Pomarede, but the two artists had a disagreement in the summer of 1848 and parted ways. Lewis worked on his panorama in Cincinnati, Ohio. There he was assisted by artists John Leslie, Edwin F. Durang, John R. Johnston and James B. Laidlaw. 

Lewis completed his panorama in 1849.  The panorama was twelve feet high and 1,325 feet long. It was advertised as Great National Work - Lewis’ Mammoth Panorama of the Mississippi River. The first showing of the panorama was in Cincinnati in May 1849. After Lewis made some additions to the panorama, it was exhibited in St. Louis from September 1 to 26, 1849, at the St. Louis Concert Hall. Lewis then toured with the panorama, visiting Milwaukee, Chicago, Detroit, upstate New York and finally Washington, D.C., then cities in Canada.

In 1851, Lewis took his panorama to Europe, where he showed the painting in England, the Netherlands and in Germany. In 1853, Lewis settled in Dusseldorf, Germany, where he spent the rest of his life. While living there, he continued to make paintings and send them to St. Louis for exhibition. Lewis returned to St. Louis in 1881 to visit relatives but only for a short time. 

Lewis sold the panorama in 1857, but he also decided to publish a book based on his sketches. The book, Das Illustrirte Mississippithal (The Mississippi Valley Illustrated) was published in twenty sections from 1854 to 1857. It includes text and seventy-eight illustrations of the Mississippi River. In 1858 a complete volume was published.