Seen from behind, a firing squad in dark blue uniforms with white belts levels its rifles at three men at the left of the picture, half hidden in a haze of gunsmoke. A gray wall stretches across the background, and a crowd of spectators appears above it in loose, hasty strokes. A signature and date are scrawled at the lower left. This small oil sketch, only about 19 by 23 inches (48 × 58 cm), belongs to the group of works Édouard Manet made about the execution of Emperor Maximilian of Mexico, who was shot with his generals Miguel Miramón and Tomás Mejía at Querétaro on June 19, 1867.

Manet, a republican who disapproved of Napoleon III's intervention in Mexico, was outraged by Maximilian's fate. He made three large paintings, a lithograph and an oil sketch. The National Gallery in London says the lithograph and the Copenhagen sketch prepared the way for the final version, now in Mannheim, with its wall scaled by onlookers. Because of the political sensitivity, none of the large versions was shown at a Salon in Manet's lifetime.

This study is in Copenhagen, Denmark.