He was instructed in drawing by John Rubens Smith, and subsequently became a pupil of Bass Otis in Philadelphia.

[3] In 1844, his work, De Soto discovering the Mississippi, was purchased by the Art Union and marked his first success as an artist.

[4] He served as vice president of the Artists' Fund Society in 1844 and as director of the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts from 1847 to 1855.

[3] During 1856-1859 he was in Europe, residing for about two years in Rome, and visiting also the principal cities in England, France, Germany, Belgium, and Italy.

His most famous paintings include Patrick Henry Before the Virginia House of Burgesses (1851), now at the Red Hill Patrick Henry National Memorial, and a massive oil painting of the Battle of Gettysburg (finished in 1871) that hangs in the State Museum of Pennsylvania.