Sepia Saturday 93: Collodion positives, early coloured portraits in Derby

For want of a photograph of a sleeping man for this week's Sepia Saturday contribution I'm going to choose the theme of early photography and the negative influence of Talbot, by continuing with another in what will be a series of posts on hand coloured portraits.


Early Derby photographers, 1854-1864
The development of commercial photography was in the doldrums throughout England in the early 1850s, largely due to Henry Fox Talbot's fierce protection of his calotype patents and his contention that Frederick Scott Archer's collodion process was merely an extension of his own discoveries. When his court case against Laroche was thrown out in December 1854, the way was clear for portrait studios to produce collodion positives on glass, and there was indeed a very rapid uptake of the by then four year-old technology. In the United States it was patented in that same year by Boston photographer Ambrose Cutting as the ambrotype.

Although Marcus Guttenberg had visited Derby briefly in 1852 (Adamson, 1997), the town's first permanent photographer of the 1850s appears to have been James Brennen who is reported to have "[taken] up Daguerreotype and turned out portraits as good as could be found at the time" in 1854 (Keene, 1886, in Birks, 1934), or perhaps even slightly earlier in 1853 (Craven, 1993). It seems likely, however, that he would have adopted the collodion positive process by early 1855, when both he and Edmund Stowe were listed in a trade directory as "photographic artists" (Kelly, 1955).


William Seville's advert in The Derby Mercury, 15 August 1855
Image © British Library Newspapers and courtesy of Gale
Later that year four more photographers - James Wilson, William Seville, Richard Smith and E.N. Charles - had opened their doors. Seville appears to have been the first to have advertised the new "collodion portraits" in the local newspaper in August 1855. Although some practitioners did not stay the course, either moving elsewhere (Seville and B.W. Botham) or into other fields (George B. Coggan and Frederick Parkes), by the end of the decade, even before the advent of the hugely popular carte de visite, the town could boast of having nine active photographic portrait studios. Thomas Roberts, Derby's first resident daguerreotypist, had returned to the fold in 1856 (White, 1857), and newcomers included John Westmoreland, James Mills and his son, also named James, Arthur Neville, William Pearson, John Thornhill and George S. Bristow (Anon, 1860).


Either Christina or Elizabeth Slater of Derby, c.1854-1858
Collodion positive portrait on glass by unidentified photographer
Image © and courtesy of Nigel Aspdin
This delicately coloured portrait of a young girl on glass belongs to Nigel Aspdin, and he believes it to be one of two sisters Christina or Elizabeth Slater of Derby. Christina and Elizabeth, then aged five and three, are shown living with their parents John and Ann Slater and two younger brothers in Fowler Street, Derby in the 1851 Census. I'd say this young girl is about seven or eight years old, which fits fairly well with my estimated date for the portrait of between 1854 and 1858, based on the clothing, hair and sitting styles. Unfortunately the sisters are too close in age for me to be able to deduce which is shown in the portrait without further information.


Deconstructed cased collodion positive portrait
Image © and courtesy of Nigel Aspdin
Nigel also sent me this photograph of the collodion positive which he had taken apart. Although I thought it would be instructive to include this image so that readers could get an idea of how such portraits were usually mounted in a case, I'm definitely not recommending that others try this with their own. Without professional knowledge and extreme care, it may result in significant, irreparable damage, particularly to the delicate photographic emulsion.


Digitally reconstructed underexposed collodion negative
Trade magazines of the time, such as The Photographic News, were full of practical advice to both professionals and amateurs, including the correct amount of exposure to give a plate which was intended for a collodion positive image. This resulted in something along the lines of what I have reconstructed digitally (above), which could then be hand coloured. After colouring, the glass plate was backed with either black varnish or felt, protected behind another layer of thin glass, and then mounted behind a brass matt or finisher with a pinchbeck surround (also known as a preserver), inside a wooden, papier mache or thermoplastic case.


B.W. Botham's advert in The Derby Mercury, 15 August 1855
Image © British Library Newspapers and courtesy of Gale
In 1858 and 1859, the The Photographic News published a series of articles containing detailed instructions on colouring collodion positives, extracts from which will serve to illustrate the process:

Photographic powder colours ... furnish the only suitable and simple means of colouring collodion positives on glass. They are applied in the form of impalpable powder, with a dry pencil, to the collodion film. They should, if properly prepared, be brilliant in colour, transparent, and, as far as possible, permanent; they should, at the same time, "bite" well, or adhere readily to the surface of the plain or varnished wet collodion film. Brushes ... For general use camel's hair is more suitable than sable ... for fine lines a few small sables will be desirable ... they should be agitated in a glass of clean water, and brought to a point by drawing them through the lips ... An India-rubber bottle, with tube attached, to blow away superlfuous colour, will be required ... Some colour on the collodion film, and leave it so; others colour thus, and then finish with varnishing; whilst others varnish first, and colour on the varnished film ... A coating of some black varnish is usually applied to the reverse side of the plate to produce the shadows. This is rarely the best method for coloured pictures ... We prefer, for this purpose, a backing of deep maroon velvet, which warms the shadows, and harmonises with the ... tints used in portraiture.

From what I can tell, this portrait only has a single colour added, decorating the girls dress a pale blue. It is a little blotchy, but does not give an unpleasing effect. The portrait itself, even though the photographer has not succeeeded in putting his subject completely at ease, is well composed and in focus, and I think demonstrates at least a moderate degree of skill. Sadly, it's not yet possible to determine who this photographer was. As further examples of portraits from the 1850s are unearthed, however, a more detailed understanding of the photographic community active at that time may bring new clues.

References

Adamson, Keith A. (1997) Professional Photographers in Derbyshire 1843-1914, Supplement to The PhotoHistorian, No. 118, September 1997, Royal Photographic Society, ISSN 0957-0209.

Anon (1858-1859) Lessons on Colouring Photographs, The Photographic News, Google Books.
Vol. 1, No. 12, 26 November, 1858, p. 138.
Vol. 1, No. 14, 10 December, 1858, p. 162.
Vol. 1, No. 15, 17 December, 1858, pp. 174-175.
Vol. 1, No. 16, 24 December, 1858, p. 186.
Vol. 1, No. 17, 31 December, 1858, pp. 199-200.
Vol. 1, No. 18, 7 January, 1859, pp. 208-209.
Vol. 1, No. 19, 14 January, 1859, p. 222.
Vol. 1, No. 20, 21 January, 1859, p. 234.
Vol. 1, No. 21, 28 January, 1859, pp. 245-246.
Vol. 1, No. 22, 4 February, 1859, pp. 258.
Vol. 1, No. 23, 11 February, 1859, p. 269.
Vol. 1, No. 24, 18 February, 1859, p. 281.
Vol. 1, No. 25, 25 February, 1859, pp. 292-293.
Vol. 1, No. 26, 4 March, 1859, pp. 302-303.

Anon (1860) Directory & Gazetteer of Derbyshire, London, England: Harrison, Harrod & Co.

Anon (1861) Census of Derby, Derbyshire, England, RG9-2505, London, England: National Archives.

Birks, Frank Elliott (1934) History of the Derby Photographic Society 1884-1934.

Craven, Maxwell (ed.) (1993) Keene's Derby, Breedon Books, Derby, pp. 200-202.

Kelly (1855) The Post Office Directory of Derbyshire & Nottinghamshire, Digital Library of Historical Directories, University of Leicester.

Rosenblum, Naomi (1984) A World History of Photography, New York: Abbeville Press, pp. 194-196.

White, Francis & Co. (1857), History, Gazetteer and Directory of the County of Derby, with the town of Burton-upon-Trent, Staffordshire, Sheffield, England: Francis White & Co.

In Death They Were Divided

Diana Burns sent me scans of three photos from her own collection asking if I had an "Oddities and Curiosities" folder containing some further examples of a similar ilk.


Diana writes: "The mounting is of the type I associate with daguerreotypes but it appears to be a carte de visite cut in two, with the remains of the sitter's female companion's dress still clearly visible. The motive for editing rather than destruction is not clear, although it may have been the cost of photos that caused the sitter to retain his own image."

I note the manner in which the photograph has been cut, leaving all extremities of the bearded man intact, rather than stright down the middle, retaining as much as possible of both people in the two halves. This suggests to me that the purpose was not make two portraits out of one, but to remove the left hand subject - who, judging from the clothing, must be a woman - from the portrait while keeping the right-hand subject whole.

This type of leatherette-covered wooden case, complete with brass "finisher," cover glass and pinchbeck surround, was indeed used for daguerreotype and ambrotype portraits, and often hinged with a velvet lined cover. However, this particular one is probably of a slightly later date - at least the late 1850s or 1860s, but possibly later - and the hanging ring just visible at the top shows that it never had a cover. Travelling photographers often used these cheap cases to house ambrotypes and tintypes, even as late as the 1890s - see this example from the 1890s which has come adrift from its case but still retains the pinchbeck surround. The small size of carte de visite portraits didn't render them ideal for framing, but I have occasionally come across them displayed in that manner. In this case, I believe someone has rather crudely inserted the remains of the cdv into a frame which originally contained some other portrait.


In the same genre, I have a photo of my husband's aunt, cut off for all eternity from (presumably) her spouse by a series of razor blade strokes (my late father-in-law is the prime suspect).


In the third example, which is a contact print made from a glass negative, someone (perhaps a child or an early animal rights activist) has crudely scratched out the face of the fur-loving woman from the negative. Nowadays, photos of detested acquaintances are likely to be simply deleted before ever seeing the light of day, but I was intrigued by the censorship methods employed by earlier generations.

I have seen many such photographs, although not from my own family collection, thank goodness. The more recent ones are often accompanied by interesting oral traditions; sadly the relevance of the excision in the older ones is usually lost.


Nigel Aspdin has an early carte de visite portrait of a large family group (click image for a larger version) by Derby photographer J. Burton & Sons, which has a similar mutilation of the face of a central seated gentleman. Since the group itself is as yet unidentified, the reason for the clearly purposeful excision of said gentleman can only be guessed at.


This particular paper print by a street photographer in Lowestoft appears to have survived unscathed, although it, too, was unwanted. As recounted in a previous Photo-Sleuth post, the former owner devised a different, but equally effective, and possibly more satisfying, innovative solution for getting rid of photographs of detested relatives. He sells them on eBay, creating, I suppose, the potential for a new genre for which someone will eventually - if they haven't already - create a Flickr group: Unadoptable Orphan Photos.

Many thanks to Diana for both the images and the idea for this article.

Sepia Saturday 73: An early daguerreotype of a Derby couple?

Three years ago David Lamb sent me these scans of what turned out to be the first, and as yet only, daguerreotype portrait from a Derby photographer that I have seen. It also happens to be one of the nicest early portraits of a couple that I've come across. The manner in which the daguerreotypist has seated and captured his subjects not just touching, but with their shoulders overlapping, the subtle tinting with which he has embellished the delicate surface of the copper plate, and despite their direct gaze into the cameras lens, give a warmth and intimacy that you don't often see in early portraits. To see what I mean, head over to the Library of Congress's large collection of daguerreotypes: of the 767 displayed online, only about twenty feature couples, including family groups, and I could only find one or two which even approach the feeling of familiarity of David's family portrait.


That the photographic medium is a thin copper sheet (measuring 65 x 80 mm or 2½" x 3¼" which is a 1/6th-plate) becomes evident when one turns it over, also revealing what are presumably fingerprints, possibly of the person who prepared and processed the photographic plate.


The copper photographic plate is housed behind a brass matte or finisher and a sheet of glass, all within a wooden case which has a patterned embossed leatherette-style finish. The presence of a catch on the right hand side indicates that, in spite of it not appearing to be damaged, only half of the case survives. The cover would have been of similar shape, probably lined internally with silk or velvet, and possibly with a maker's mark.


The main reason that the images have been laguishing in my email inbox for so long is that I was really in need of some extra clues to help me proceed with its evaluation. My knowledge of clothing styles, particularly in the 1840s and 1850s, when the daguerreotype was at its most popular in the United Kingdom, is meagre. From what I can tell, the narrow lapels on the man's coat, together with her lace collar, neck brooch and wide sleeves, suggest that it was taken in the 1840s rather than the 1850s, but I can't be any more precise than that. If any readers can tell me more about the clothing, I'd be most grateful.


There is a mark stamped into the front of the plate, in the top right hand corner: "NP: 40" appears from the list of daguerreotype plate marks on the Historic Camera web site, to refer to a French firm operating "c.1840," but I've been able to find out nothing further about the company, how long it was operating, etc. Many of the English daguerreotypists imported their plates from France, so this does not preclude the plate from having been exposed in England. I understand that the number "40" referred to the purity of the plate, i.e. 1 part silver to 40 parts copper.


Timeline of Early Derby Photographers 1843-1863
(click image for a more detailed version)
© 2011 Brett Payne
As described in David Simkin's piece on early Derby photographers on my web site, and shown in the diagrammatic timeline (above), initial attempts by John Johnson and Thomas Roberts to operate daguerreotype studios in Derby between July 1843 and September 1845 were hampered by Richard Beard's financially restrictive and rigidly enforced patent agreements. No records of any further daguerreotypes taken in Derby have been found, until Marcus Guttenberg paid a brief visit in September 1852.

The expiry of Beard's country-wide patent in August 1853, and the almost coincident invention of the collodion positive process by Frederick Scott Archer, resulted in an explosion in photographer numbers in Derby from 1854 onwards. From a total of two practitioners at the end of that year, the number had ballooned to nine by the end of the decade, but there is no indication that any of them used the daguerreotype process. From advertisements in newspapers and trade directories of the time, the evidence points rather to calotypes, albumen prints and collodion positives being the media of choice in the 1850s and, after the popularisation of cartes de visite in the early 1860s, a rapid conversion to that format by about 1863.

However, it would be dangerous to assume from this data that Derby residents were unable to have their portraits captured by daguerreotype between late 1845 and mid-1852. As shown by an 1843 advertisement in The Derby Mercury, the successive occupants of the Bromley House portrait studio in nearby Nottingham, which operated almost continuously from late 1841 through the 1840s and 1850s, were not slow to look for potential customers in neighbouring towns. Nottingham was only a short train trip, or coach ride, away.

It's always important to record and investigate the provenance of a photograph. David wrote:

This photo was in a box that my father shoved at me, to see if I was interested. Since most of the photos were of my mother's family - and since this couple bears no resemblance to any of the photos of have for my father's (Scottish) side - it would seem most likely that this couple are connected to my mother. Many of the photos were of the Holmes family, so I suspect this one is too.

Ancestors of Reuben Holmes (1855-1929) & Ellen Alton (1856-1937)
Click image for a readable version
David has written about his Holmes family from Derby on his web page, from which - together with a little research of my own - I was able to extract sufficent details to draw up a chart showing the first two generations of ancestors of Reuben Holmes (1855-1929) and his wife Ellen Alton (1856-1937). I should point out that my deductions differ slightly from David's, in that I have a different set of maternal grandparents for Reuben.

There are seven different couples who could conceivably be the subjects of the portrait, as follows:

(A) John HOLMES (1826-1895) + Elizabeth HAWORTH (1829-1890)
(B) William ALTON (1826-1897) + Grace SHAW (1816-1897)
(C) Grace SHAW (1816-1897) + George GREAVES (d.1849)
(D) William HOLMES (c1807-1885) + Sarah TWIGG (1803-1856)
(E) James HAWORTH (d. bef 1841) + Mary SLATER (c1788-1841)
(F) Thomas ALTON (1790-1872) + Hannah TIMPERLEY (c1791-1875)
(G) John SHAW (1773-c1850s) + Sarah (c1771-c1850s)

The couple look to me to be in their late 30s or early to mid-40s. If one assumes the broadest possible date for the daguerreotype, i.e. that it was taken some time in the 1840s or 1850s, then the parents of both Reuben and Ellen (A & B) can be ruled out as being too young. Ellen's mother and her first husband (C) could have visited a studio prior to 1849, but she would have been in her late 20s or early 30s, again too young. Both of Reuben's maternal grandparents (E) died before the photographic studios were first established. Ellen's paternal grandparents (F), although still alive till the 1870s, would already have been in their 50s by the time daguerreotypes were available. Her maternal grandparents (G), who died in the 1850s, would have been even older.

The only candidates remaining are Reuben's paternal grandparents William HOLMES and Sarah TWIGG. Born in 1803, she was slightly older than her husband, and would have been in her early 40s when John Johnson and Thomas Roberts operated Derby's first photographic studio in Victoria Street. William Holmes was a coachman for much of his life, settling in Derby in the late 1830s. The fact that he is also described as a gardener in some census records suggests to me that he may have worked for a member of the landed gentry, rather than on a coach which ferried paying passengers between towns. It is quite conceivable that his employer paid for this portrait, as even a 1/6th-plate daguerreotype in the 1840s was an expensive item. Thomas Roberts advertises his "small size, two sitters on same plate" with "case, glass and mat inclusive" for £1 6s. in 1844. Using average earnings, the following estimator gives an equivalent value of over £1000 today. Looking at it from slightly different point of view, a coachman might expect to earn between 1 and 2 pounds a week in the 1840s.

However, as I've pointed out previously, they could alternatively have visited a studio further afield, perhaps in Nottingham. It is also woth reiterating that David has not completely ruled out the portrait being from another branch of his family, just suggested that it is unlikely. The possibilities are of course endless, the probabilities much less so.

Alan Burnett's prompt for this week's Sepia Saturday, for which this article is a submission, features an aged couple holding hands, photographed in Sweden in 1932. I hunted through my own collection for a similar shot that I felt would be appropriate, but the only image I could find was an ambrotype that I presented in a previous article (here). Searching further afield yielded similarly few early images of couples holding hands, which I suppose is understandable considering it was not generally considered an appropriate pose amongst most Victorian photographers. Would Mr and Mrs Samuelsson, of Stigåsa, Småland, Sweden have been bold enough to hold hands (and what enormous hands they are!) when they visited the photographer's studio at the time of their presumed wedding around 1890-ish, or did old age bring with it a good deal more daring?

Head off to Sepia Saturday now for a browse, and see how many more daring couples you can find.

References

Coe, Brian (1976) The Birth of Photography: The story of the formative years, 1800-1900, London: Spring Books, 144p, ISBN 0600562964.

Heathcote, Bernard V. & Heathcote, Pauline F. (2001) Pioneers of Photography in Nottinghamshire 1841-1910, Nottinghamshire County Council, 62p, ISBN 0902751387.

Payne, Brett (2008) Thomas Roberts (1804-1885), one of Derby's first photographers, Photo-Sleuth, 18 May 2008.

Simkin, David (2004) The First Derby Daguerreotypists, 1842-1844, on Derbyshire Photographers & Photographic Studios.

Victorian Society, from Census Helper: Victorian Life.

Ambrotypes - portraits for the middle class

Although photography had been "invented" by Louis Daguerre and William Henry Fox Talbot in the late 1830s, the daguerreotype remained expensive, and only affordable to the relatively wealthy, including the professional and political classes. With the introduction by Frederick Scott Archer of the glass negative process in 1851, and the ambrotype three years later, the cost was reduced considerably - they were available for between sixpence and a shilling - and photographic portraiture became easily accessible to the middle class. In contrast to daguerreotypes, which remain fairly rare, there are still many ambrotypes in existence in family collections, and you may well have one among your old family heirlooms. Although ambrotypes continued in occasional use until about 1880, they were most popular in the decade from 1855 until 1865, after which they were overtaken and superseded by the carte de visite.

The ambrotype was created by coating a glass plate with collodion and photosensitive silver nitrate. The plate was exposed in a camera, then quickly taken out and treated in a dark room with a developing solution to bring out the image. This produced a photographic negative which was then backed with something dark, such as dark felt or black varnish, which had the effect of inverting the image. It was then mounted and framed or cased, as had been the daguerreotype.


The ambrotype shown above is one from my own small collection. Unusually for Victorian portraits, both subjects are smiling, and she is grasping his hand quite firmly, which is what attracted me to it in the first instance. Unfortunately it has lost the frame or case in which it would have originally been mounted, but the the thin gilded, pressed metal, decorative frame is still present and in good condition. It shows the characteristic greyish appearance of an ambrotype - few of them have any of the lighter shades, and if you see lighter areas, it is wise to look for signs of touching up or that it may in fact be a cased tintype.

The three-quarter length portrait is of an unidentified seated couple, perhaps in their mid- to late 20s. I think they must be a recently married couple, because her wedding ring, earrings and the brooch at her neck, as well as his shirt buttons, have been highlighted with gold paint. It is interesting to note that the ring is on her left hand. As the ambrotype was a negative, the image would be reversed and ring should have been on her right hand. The photographer appears to have anticipated the problem, and perhaps instructed her to change the ring to the opposite hand and finger. As the enlarged and enhanced image below shows, however, she appears to also have a less prominent - and ungilded - ring on her "right" hand! The photographer's artist obviously took some liberties. The buttons on the gentleman's shirt and waistcoat give the game away, as they appear to be done up on the wrong side.


Typically for portraits from the mid- to late 1850s, they are seated side by side. This pose was not commonly used again in portraiture, except in the case of larger groups, and by some less experienced artists, until much later in the century. The woman's clothing (bell-shaped, layered and fringed sleeves, pleated bodice closed at the top with a gold brooch and trimmed with a lace collar, pointing downwards to a tightly corseted waist; a single full, ground-length skirt) and hair style (centrally parted, curved back down over the forehead to almost cover her ears, and drawn back to a bun on the back of her head) are indicative of the mid-1850s. The young man is wearing what appears to be a frock coat, simple dark waistcoat, and shirt with a turned over collar and rather untidily knotted bowtie. He has a slight Quaker-style chin-beard, with only a suggestion of a moustache, and hair parted on his "left"(right)-hand side.

I estimate that this was quite an early ambrotype, and probably dates from between 1854 and 1857. Nobody looks quite the same in the mirror - in other words, nobody has an absolutely symmetrical face. For the first time in a century and a half, we can now view the photo as it might have been printed more accurately, had the technology been available at the time.


References:
Dating Family Photos 1850-1920, by Lenore Frost, self publ. 1991, Essendon, Victoria, Australia.
Family Photographs 1860-1945, by Robert Pols, publ. 2002 by Public Record Office, London, England.