More photographs of and by F.J. Seaman

Further to my previous article about Frederick Joseph Seaman (1874-1953), I've received further information and photographs from his grand-daughter Anne Williams, and John Bradley, which are probably worth including as a separate post, rather than merely appending to the original one.


Anne sent me this rather nice studio self portrait by F.J. Seaman, taken at an unknown location and date. It appears to be a post card size, although I don't know if it has anything printed or inscribed on the reverse. Based merely on a comparison with other portraits of FJS, I estimate it was taken around the time of the First World War.


She also sent me a later family portrait, possibly taken in the mid- to late 1920s, showing FJS with Evie, Mable Maude (seated - the elder daughter, and always known as Maude) and Maud's husband, Ormonde Vivian O. Blackmore. Maud and Evie's mother Bertha died at Sculcoates (Hull) in 1912, and their father remarried the following year, also at Sculcoates, to Hilda Blanche Bailey Jackson. Their twin sons Austin and Stanley were born in 1914 at Blackpool. They moved to Doncaster in 1915 and stayed there until 1926, when they moved back to Chesterfield and lived over the shop.

This now gives a continuous and very useful time frame for the operation of the various F.J. Seaman studios as follows:

(1891-1896 : Chesterfield, Ilkeston, Alfreton in Derbyshire - as Seaman & Sons)
1897-1903 : Hucknall Torkard, Nottinghamshire
?1898-1903 : Heanor, Derbyshire (also possibly open in 1905-1906)
1903-1907 : Sculcoates, Hull, Yorkshire (also at York, Beverley, Darlington, Bridlington and Scarborough?)
1907-1915 : Blackpool, Lancashire
?1909-1912 : Davygate, York, Yorkshire
1915-1926 : Doncaster, Yorkshire
1926-1950 : Chesterfield, Derbyshire


John Bradley has this post card portrait of a very smartly dressed young couple taken in F.J. Seaman's Blackpool studio, probably shortly before the war, say between 1910 and 1914.

Many thanks to Anne Williams and John Bradley for their contributions.