Burning of Old South Church, Bath, Maine

John Hilling (1822-1908) was an American painter known for his landscape and marine subjects of the Maine coast. Burning of Old South Church, Bath, Maine from c. 1854 depicts the dramatic destruction by fire of the Old South Church in Bath, Maine—a documentary subject that combines landscape painting with historical event in the manner of American event painting of the mid-19th century. The c. 1854 date places this close to the actual event, and the painting serves as both a landscape and a visual record of a community disaster that was of great significance to the residents of Bath.

Burning of Old South Church is important in the history of American painting because it demonstrates the tradition of event painting—paintings that document dramatic local events with the same seriousness that European painting brought to historical subjects. The painting combines the landscape tradition of the Hudson River School with the documentary function of local history, creating a type of American painting that served both aesthetic and commemorative purposes.

Burning of Old South Church, Bath, Maine is American event painting as both landscape and document: the dramatic destruction of a community church rendered with the landscape tradition's seriousness applied to a local historical event. The c. 1854 painting serves both aesthetic and commemorative functions in recording a community disaster.