In the latest issue of Civil War Times, on the last page there is the image below.  With a blow up of the 2 guys playing cards.  The one on the left appears to have 4 aces and the one on the right has a hand of face cards.



TITLE:  [District of Columbia. White officers of 4th U.S. Colored Infantry at leisure, Fort Slocum]
CALL NUMBER:  LC-B817- 7851[P&P]

The magazine caption has the guy on the right as the winner.  But I figured the 4 aces would have won the hand.  Since you need an Ace for a Royal Flush.  Maybe I am mistaken in this.

But there seem to be some other neat things in the image too.  The presence of the young boy, the man in the window of the building.  The different hats that are present in the image.  

--Last edited by lhsnj on 2007-11-22 22:23:08 --

it would be a straight flush instead of a royal flush.

Thanks, I forgot about the straight flush.  
When the caption mentioned face cards, the first thing that came to mind was a royal flush and when I checked some sites about hand rankings, I missed the straight.. and saw 4 of a kind as the next hand to win.

i had to ask the hubby... i dont know a thing about poker lol.

Photos like this are my favorites. Obviously being a staged shot, these officers went to some effort for the photo.
As to the poker hand, if the one fellow had 5 face cards, he couldn't have a king high straight flush, which would require a 9 and a 10 to complete. Obviously, he can have a straight flush using any 5 cards in a row suited, but with all the face cards I can't tell how many cards each man is holding, but it seems to be 5. My guess is that it being a staged photo that the poker players grabbed a couple of decks and made a good looking hand for the camera.

Gregg Hensley  

--Last edited by Gregg Hensley on 2007-11-25 19:33:58 --