Albumen print carte de visite on card mount with gilt double-rule border, retaining the standard E. & H.T. Anthony / Mathew Brady backmark on verso. Washington, D.C., negative exposed 24 February 1861; printed ca. 1861 - 1862. Mount measures approx. 2 1/2 x 4 in. Corners historically trimmed for period album insertion.

A definitive portrait of Abraham Lincoln taken during his first photographic sitting as President-Elect in the nation's capital. Cataloged in the Lloyd Ostendorf census as O-51B, Lincoln is captured full-length in profile facing right, seated in an upholstered armchair beside a scalloped side table holding an inkwell and feather quill pen. Behind him stands a classical plinth against a patterned studio carpet. He is attired in a dark tailored suit, waistcoat, and black bow tie, displaying the distinguished new beard he grew during the transition following his election.

The negative was exposed by Alexander Gardner at Mathew Brady's Washington gallery on Sunday, 24 February 1861, just one day after Lincoln’s secretly arranged predawn arrival in Washington to evade the Baltimore assassination plot, and barely a week prior to his First Inauguration. Mass-produced and distributed nationwide through Brady’s publishing partnership with E. & H.T. Anthony, this image introduced the American public to their newly bearded commander-in-chief on the eve of the Civil War.

[Carte de Visite, CDV, Abraham Lincoln, President Abraham Lincoln, Ostendorf O-51, O-51B, Mathew Brady, E. & H.T. Anthony, Alexander Gardner, 1861, First Inaugural, Civil War, Lincolniana, 19th Century Photography]

Very good condition. The print displays even sepia tones and sharp focal depth.  We note faint background mottling. The mount remains structurally sound with clipped corners for period album display.