there; at Whitby, Mr. Stonehouse; and I did not like the appearance of
Redcar, so I settled upon Tynemouth, and did fairly well for a short
season. About the end of October I went on to Carlisle, but a Scotchman
had already preceded me there, and I thought one Daguerreotypist was
quite enough for so small a place, and pushed on to Penrith, where I
settled for the winter and gradually worked up a little connection, and
formed some life-long friendships. I was the first Daguerreotypist who
had visited the town of Penrith, and while there I made Daguerreotypes
of Sir George and Lady Musgrave and family, and some members of the
Lonsdale family. It was through the kindness of Miss Lowther that I was
induced to go to Whitehaven, but I did not do much business there, so,
after a bad winter, I resolved to go to America in the spring, and made
arrangements for the voyage immediately. Thinking that I would find
better apparatus and appliances in America, I disposed of my "Tent and
Kit," closed up my affairs, bid adieu to my relatives and friends, and
departed.
To obtain the benefit and experience of a long sea voyage, I secured a
cabin passage in a sailing ship named the _Amazon_, and sailed from
Shields towards the end of April, 1853. We crossed the Tyne bar late in
the evening with a fair wind, and sailed away for the Pentland Frith so
as to gain the Atlantic by sailing all round the North of Scotland. I
was rather upset the first night, but recovered my appetite next
morning. We entered the Pentland Frith on the Saturday afternoon, and
were running through the Channel splendidly, when the carpenter came to
report water in the well--I forget how many feet--but he thought it
would not be safe to attempt crossing the Atlantic. I was a little
alarmed at this, but the captain took it very coolly, and ordered the
ship to be pumped every watch. Being the only passenger, I became a kind
of chum and companion to the captain, and as we sat over our grog that
night in the cabin our conversation naturally turned upon the condition
of the ship, when he remarked that he was disappointed, and that he
"expected he had got a sound ship under his feet this time." These words
did not make much impression upon me then, but I had reason to
comprehend their meaning afterwards. I was awoke early on the Sunday
morning by the noise caused by the working of the pumps, and on going on
deck found that we were becalmed, lying off the coast of Caithnesshire,
and the water pouring out of the pump-hole in a continuous stream. After
breakfast, and while sitting on the taffrail of the quarterdeck along
with the captain, waiting for a breeze, I asked him if he intended to
cross the Atlantic in such a leaky vessel. He answered "Yes, and the men
are all willing." So I thought if these men were not afraid of the ship
foundering, I need not be; but I had reasons afterwards for coming to an
opposite conclusion.
Towards evening the breeze sprang up briskly, and away we went, the
ship heading W.N.W., as the captain said he wanted to make the northern
passage. Next morning we were in a rather rough sea, and a gale of wind
blowing. One of the yards was broken with the force of the wind, and the
sail and broken yard dangled about the rigging for a considerable time
before the sail could be hauled in and the wreckage cleared up. We had
several days of bad weather, and one morning when I got up I found the
ship heading East. I naturally concluded that we were returning, but the
captain said that he had only turned the ship about to enable the men to
stop a leak in her bows. The carpenter afterwards told me that the water
came in there like a river during the night. Thus we went on through
variable weather until at last we sighted two huge icebergs, and then
Newfoundland, when the captain informed me that he intended now to coast
up to New York. We got out of sight of land occasionally, and one day,
after the captain had taken his observations and worked out the ship's
position, he called my attention to the chart, and observed that he
intended to sail between an island and the mainland, but as the Channel
was subject to strong and variable currents, it was a rather dangerous
experiment. Being in such a leaky ship, I thought he wanted to hug the
land as much as possible, which I considered a very wise and safe
proceeding; but he had ulterior objects in view, which the sequel will
reveal.
On the night of the 31st of May, after a long yarn from the captain
about how he was once wrecked on an iceberg, I turned in with a feeling
of perfect safety, for the sea was calm, the night clear, and the wind
fair and free; but about daylight next morning I was awoke with a shock,
a sudden tramping on deck, and the mate shouting down the companion
stairs, "Captain, the ship's ashore." Both the captain and I rushed on
deck just as we jumped out of our berths, but we could not see anything
of the land or shore, for we were enveloped in a thick fog. We heard the
breakers and felt the thud of the waves as they broke upon the ship,
but whether we had struck on a rock or grounded on a sandy beach we
could not then ascertain. The captain ordered the sails to be "slewed
back" and a hawser to be thrown astern, but all efforts to get the ship
off were in vain, for with every wave the ship forged more and more on
to the shore.
As the morning advanced, the fog cleared away a little, which enabled us
to see dimly through the mist the top of a bank of yellow sand. This
sight settled the doubt as to our whereabouts, and the captain
immediately gave the order "Prepare to abandon the ship." The long boat
was at once got ready, and lowered with considerable difficulty, for the
ship was then more among the breakers. After a good deal of delay and
danger, we all succeeded in leaving the ship and clearing the breakers.
We were exposed in the open boats all that day and night, and about ten
o'clock next morning we effected a landing on the lee side of the
island, which we ascertained to be Sable Island, a bald crown of one of
the banks of Newfoundland. Here we received help, shelter, and
provisions, all provided by the Home and Colonial Governments, for the
relief of shipwrecked people, for this island was one of the places
where ships were both accidentally and wilfully wrecked. We were obliged
to stay there sixteen days before we could get a vessel to take us to
Halifax, Nova Scotia, the nearest port, and would possibly have had to
remain on the island much longer, but for a mutiny among the crew. I
could describe some strange and startling incidents in connection with
the wreck and mutiny, but I will not allow myself to be tempted further
into the vale of divergence, as the chief object I have in view is my
reminiscence of photography.
On leaving Sable Island I was taken to Halifax, where I waited the
arrival of the Cunard steamer _Niagara_, to take me on to Boston; thence
I proceeded by rail and steamer to New York, where I arrived about the
end of June, 1853.
On landing in New York I only knew one individual, and not knowing how
far I should have to go to find him I put up at an hotel on Broadway,
but soon found that too expensive for my means, and went to a private
boarding house as soon as I could.
Visiting all the leading Daguerreotypists on Broadway, I was somewhat
astonished at their splendid reception rooms, and the vast number of
large and excellent specimens exhibited. Their plain Daguerreotypes were
all of fine quality, and free from the "buff lines" so noticeable in
English work at that period; but all their attempts at colouring were
miserable failures, and when I showed one of my coloured specimens to
Mr. Gurney, he said, "Well, if you can colour one of my pictures like
that I'll believe you;" which I soon did, and very much to his
astonishment. In those days I prepared my own colours, and Mr. Gurney
bought a box immediately. The principal Daguerreotypists in New York at
that time were Messrs. Brady, Gurney, Kent, Lawrence, Mead Brothers, and
Samuel Root, and I called upon them all before I entered into any
business arrangements, finally engaging myself to Messrs. Mead Brothers
as a colourist and teacher of colouring for six months, and while
fulfilling that engagement I gave lessons to several "Daguerreans," and
made the acquaintance of men from all parts of the Union, for I soon
obtained some notoriety throughout the States in consequence of a man
named Humphrey attacking me and my colouring process in a photographic
journal which bore his name, as well as in the _New York Tribune_. I
replied to his attack in the columns of the _Tribune_, but I saw that he
had a friend on the staff, and I did not feel inclined to continue the
controversy. Mr. Humphrey knew nothing about my process, but began and
continued the discussion on his knowledge of what was known as the
"Isinglass Process," which was not mine. After completing my engagements
with Messrs. Mead Brothers, I made arrangements to supply the stock
dealers with my prepared colours, and travel the States myself to
introduce them to all the Daguerreans residing in the towns and cities I
should visit.
In the principal cities I found all the Daguerreans quite equal to the
best in New York, and all doing good business, and I gave lessons in
colouring to most of them. In Newark I met Messrs. Benjamin and Polson;
in Philadelphia, Marcus Root and Dr. Bushnell. I encountered a great many
_doctors_ and _professors_ in the business in America. In Baltimore,
Maryland--then a slave State--many of the Daguerreans owned slaves. In
Washington D.C., I renewed my acquaintance with Mr. George Adams, one of
the best Daguerreans in the City; and while visiting him a very curious
thing occurred. One of the representatives of the South came in to have
his portrait taken, and the first thing he did was to lay a revolver and
a bowie knife on the table beside him. He had just come from the House
of Representatives. His excuse for such a proceeding was that he had
bought some slaves at the market at Alexandria, and was going to take
them home that night. He was a very tall man, and when he stood up
against the background his head was above it. As he wanted to be taken
standing, this put Mr. Adams into a dilemma, and he asked what he should
do. I thought the only thing that could be done was to move the
background up and down during exposure, which we did, and so obviated
the appearance of a line crossing the head.
While staying in Washington I attended one of the levees at the White
House, and was introduced to President Pearce. There was no fuss or
difficulty in gaining admission. I had only to present my card at the
door, and the City Marshall at once led me into the room where the
President, surrounded by some of his Cabinet, was waiting to receive,
and I was introduced. After a cordial shake of his hand, I passed on to
another saloon where there was music and promenading in mixed costumes,
for most of the men were dressed as they liked, and some of the ladies
wore bonnets. It was the weekly _sans ceremonie_ reception. Finding many
of the people of Washington very agreeable and hospitable, I stayed
there a considerable time. When I started on the southern journey I did
intend to go on to New Orleans, but I stayed so long in Philadelphia and
Washington the summer was too far advanced, and as a rather severe
outbreak of yellow fever had occurred, I returned to New York and took a
journey northward, visiting Niagara Falls, and going on to Canada. I
sailed up the Hudson River, stopping at Albany and Troy. At the latter
place I met an Englishman, named Irvine, a Daguerrean who treated me
hospitably, and for whom I coloured several Daguerreotypes. He wanted me
to stay with him, but that I declined. Thence I proceeded to Rochester,
and there found that one of my New York pupils had been before me,
representing himself as Werge the colourist, for when I introduced
myself to the principal Daguerrean he told me that Werge--a very
different man--had been there two or three weeks ago. I discovered who
the fellow was, and that he had practised a piece of Yankee smartness
for which I had no redress. From Rochester I proceeded to Buffalo, where
I met with another instance of Yankee smartness of a different kind. I
had sold some colours to a man there who paid me in dollar bills, the
usual currency of the country, but when I tendered one of these bills
for payment at the hotel, it was refused. I next offered it on board a
steamboat, but there it was also declined. When I had an opportunity I
returned it to the man who gave it to me, and requested him to send me a
good one instead. He was honest enough to do that, and impudent enough
to tell me that he knew it was bad when he gave it to me, but as I was a
stranger he thought I might pass it off easily.
I next went to Niagara Falls, where it was my good fortune to encounter
two very different specimens of American character in the persons of Mr.
Easterly and Mr. Babbitt, the former a visitor and the latter a resident
Daguerrean, who held a monopoly from General Porter to Daguerreotype
the Falls and visitors. He had a pavilion on the American side of the
Falls, under which his camera was in position all day long, and when a
group of visitors stood on the shore to survey the Falls from that
point, he took the group--without their knowledge--and showed it to the
visitors before they left. In almost every instance he sold the picture
at a good price; the people were generally delighted to be taken at the
Falls. I need hardly say that they were all taken instantaneously, and
embraced a good general view, including the American Fall, Goat Island,
the Horse Shoe Fall, and the Canadian shore. Many of these views I
coloured for Mr. Babbitt, but there was always a beautiful green colour
on the brink of the Horse Shoe Fall which I never could match. For many
years I possessed one of Mr. Babbitt's Daguerreotype views, as well as
others taken by Mr. Easterly and myself, but I had the misfortune to be
deprived of them all by fire. Some years after I lent them to an
exhibition in Glasgow, which was burnt down, and all the exhibits
destroyed. After a delightful sojourn of three weeks at Niagara Falls, I
took steamer on the lower Niagara River, sailed down to Lake Ontario,
and down the River St. Lawrence, shooting the Lachine Rapids, and on to
Montreal.
In the Canadian City I did not find business very lively, so after
viewing the fine Cathedral of Notre Dame, the mountain, and other
places, I left Montreal and proceeded by rail to Boston. The difference
between the two cities was immense. Montreal was dull and sleepy, Boston
was all bustle and life, and the people were as unlike as the cities. On
my arrival in Boston, I put up at the Quincy Adams Hotel, and spent the
first few days in looking about the somewhat quaint and interesting old
city, hunting up Franklin Associations, and revolutionary landmarks,
Bunker Hill, and other places of interest. Having satisfied my appetite
for these things, I began to look about me with an eye to business, and
called upon the chief Daguerreans and photographers in Boston. Messrs.
Southworth and Hawes possessed the largest Daguerreotype establishment,
and did an excellent business. In their "Saloon" I saw the largest and
finest revolving stereoscope that was ever exhibited. The pictures were
all whole-plate Daguerreotypes, and set vertically on the perpendicular
drum on which they revolved. The drum was turned by a handle attached to
cog wheels, so that a person sitting before it could see the
stereoscopic pictures with the utmost ease. It was an expensive
instrument, but it was a splendid advertisement, for it drew crowds to
their saloon to see it and to sit, and their enterprise met with its
reward.
At Mr. Whipple's gallery, in Washington Street, a dual photography was
carried on, for he made both Daguerreotypes and what he called
"crystallotypes," which were simply plain silver prints obtained from
collodion negatives. Mr. Whipple was the first American photographer who
saw the great commercial advantages of the collodion process over the
Daguerreotype, and he grafted it on the elder branch of photography
almost as soon as it was introduced. Indeed, Mr. Whipple's establishment
may be considered the very cradle of American photography as far as
collodion negatives and silver prints are concerned, for he was the very
first to take hold of it with spirit, and as early as 1853 he was doing
a large business in photographs, and teaching the art to others.
Although I had taken collodion negatives in England with Mawson's
collodion in 1852, I paid Mr. Whipple fifty dollars to be shown how he
made his collodion, silver bath, developer, printing, &c., &c., for
which purpose he handed me over to his active and intelligent assistant
and newly-made partner, Mr. Black. This gave me the run of the
establishment, and I was somewhat surprised to find how vast and varied
were his mechanical appliances for reducing labour and expediting work.
The successful practice of the Daguerreotype art greatly depended on the
cleanness and highly polished surface of the silvered plates, and to
secure these necessary conditions, Mr. Whipple had, with characteristic
and Yankee-like ingenuity, obtained the assistance of a steam engine
which not only "drove" all the circular cleaning and buffing wheels, but
an immense circular fan which kept the studio and sitters delightfully
cool. Machinery and ingenuity did a great many things in Mr. Whipple's
establishment in the early days of photography. Long before the
Ambrotype days, pictures were taken on glass and thrown upon canvas by
means of the oxyhydrogen light for the use of artists. At that early
period of the history of photography, Messrs. Whipple and Black did an
immense "printing and publishing" trade, and their facilities were
"something considerable." Their toning, fixing, and washing baths were
almost worthy the name of vats.
Messrs. Masury and Silsby were also early producers of photographs in
Boston, and in 1854 employed a very clever operator, Mr. Turner, who
obtained beautiful and brilliant negatives by iron development. On the
whole, I think Boston was ahead of New York for enterprise and the use
of mechanical appliances in connection with photography. I sold my
colours to most of the Daguerreotypists, and entered into business
relations with two of the dealers, Messrs. French and Cramer, to stock
them, and then started for New York to make arrangements for my return
to England.
When I returned to New York the season was over, and everyone was
supposed to be away at Saratoga Springs, Niagara Falls, Rockaway, and
other fashionable resorts; but I found the Daguerreotype galleries all
open and doing a considerable stroke of business among the cotton
planters and slave holders, who had left the sultry south for the cooler
atmosphere of the more northern States. The Daguerreotype process was
then in the zenith of its perfection and popularity, and largely
patronised by gentlemen from the south, especially for large or double
whole-plates, about 16 by 12 inches, for which they paid fifty dollars
each. It was only the best houses that made a feature of these large
pictures, for it was not many of the Daguerreans that possessed a
"mammoth tube and box"--_i.e._, lens and camera--or the necessary
machinery to "get up" such large surfaces, but all employed the best
mechanical means for cleaning and polishing their plates, and it was
this that enabled the Americans to produce more brilliant pictures than
we did. Many people used to say it was the climate, but it was nothing
of the kind. The superiority of the American Daguerreotype was entirely
due to mechanical appliances. Having completed my business arrangements
and left my colours on sale with the principal stock dealers, including
the Scovill Manufacturing Company, Messrs. Anthony, and Levi Chapman.
I sailed from New York in October 1854, and arrived in England in due
time without any mishap, and visiting London again as soon as I could, I
called at Mr. Mayall's gallery in Regent Street to see Dr. Bushnell,
whom I knew in Philadelphia, and who was then operating for Mr. Mayall.
While there Mr. Mayall came in from the Guildhall, and announced the
result of the famous trial, "Talbot _versus_ Laroche," a verbatim report
of which is given in the Journal of the Photographic Society for
December 21st, 1854. Mr. Mayall was quite jubilant, and well he might
be, for the verdict for the defendant removed the trammels which Mr. Fox
Talbot attempted to impose upon the practice of the collodion process,
which was Frederick Scott Archer's gift to photographers. That was the
first time that I had met Mr. Mayall, though I had heard of him and
followed him both at Philadelphia and New York, and even at Niagara
Falls. At that time Mr. Mayall was relinquishing the Daguerreotype
process, though one of the earliest practitioners, for he was in
business as a Daguerreotypist in Philadelphia from 1842 to 1846, and I
know that he made a Daguerreotype portrait of James Anderson, the
tragedian, in Philadelphia, on Sunday, May 18th, 1845. During part of
the time that he was in Philadelphia he was in partnership with Marcus
Root, and the name of the firm was "Highschool and Root," and about the
end of 1846 Mr. Mayall opened a Daguerreotype studio in the Adelaide
Gallery, King William Street, Strand, London, under the name of
Professor Highschool, and soon after that he opened a Daguerreotype
gallery in his own name in the Strand, which establishment he sold to
Mr. Jabez Hughes in 1855. The best Daguerreotypists in London in 1854
were Mr. Beard, King William Street, London Bridge; Messrs. Kilburn, T.
R. Williams and Claudet, in Regent Street; and W. H. Kent, in Oxford
Street. The latter had just returned from America, and brought all the
latest improvements with him. Messrs. Henneman and Malone were in Regent
Street doing calotype portraits. Henneman had been a servant to Fox
Talbot, and worked his process under favourable conditions. Mr. Lock was
also in Regent Street, doing coloured photographs. He offered me a
situation at once, if I could colour photographs as well as I could
colour Daguerreotypes, but I could not, for the processes were totally
different. M. Manson, an old Frenchman, was the chief Daguerreotype
colourist in London, and worked for all the principal Daguerreotypists.
I met the old gentleman first in 1851, and knew him for many years
afterwards. He also made colours for sale. Not meeting with anything to
suit me in London, I returned to the North, calling at Birmingham on my
way, where I met Mr. Whitlock, the chief Daguerreotypist there, and a
Mr. Monson, who professed to make Daguerreotypes and all other types.
Paying a visit to Mr. Elisha Mander, the well-known photographic case
maker, I learnt that Mr. Jabez Hughes, then in business in Glasgow, was
in want of an assistant, a colourist especially. Having met Mr. Hughes
in Glasgow in 1852, and knowing what kind of man he was, I wrote to him,
and was engaged in a few days. I went to Glasgow in January, 1855, and
then commenced business relations and friendship with Mr. Hughes that
lasted unbroken until his death in 1884. My chief occupation was to
colour the Daguerreotypes taken by Mr. Hughes, and occasionally take
sitters, when Mr. Hughes was busy, in another studio. I had not,
however, been long in Glasgow, when Mr. Hughes determined to return to
London. At first he wished me to accompany him, but it was ultimately
arranged that I should purchase the business, and remain in Glasgow,
which I did, and took possession in June, Mr. Hughes going to Mr.
Mayall's old place in the Strand, London. Mr. Hughes had been in Glasgow
for nearly seven years, and had done a very good business, going first
as operator to Mr. Bernard, and succeeding to the business just as I was
doing. While Mr. Hughes was in Glasgow he was very popular, not only as
a Daguerreotypist, but as a lecturer. He delivered a lecture on
photography at the Literary and Philosophical Society, became an active
member of the Glasgow Photographic Society, and an enthusiastic member
of the St. Mark's Lodge of Freemasons. Only a day or two before he left
Glasgow, he occupied the chair at a meeting of photographers, comprising
Daguerreotypists and collodion workers, to consider what means could be
adopted to check the downward tendency of prices even in those early
days. I was present, and remember seeing a lady Daguerreotypist among
the company, and she expressed her opinion quite decidedly. Efforts were
made to enter into a compact to maintain good prices, but nothing came
of it. Like all such bandings together, the band was quickly and easily
broken.