Collection: Henry Taylor Paper Negative Collection

Description

A collection of three hundred and twenty-seven paper negatives, dating to between 1855 and 1861, and attributed to Henry Taylor (fl. 1851-1891), a chemist and photographer.

Henry Taylor lived and worked in Godalming, Surrey, in the 1850s and is recorded as living in Aylesbury, Buckinghamshire in 1871, and London in 1881 and 1891. He died in Reigate, Surrey.

The negatives form one of earliest known photographic collection in the archive and cover a wide variety of sites and locations; although Sussex is particularly well represented.

Among the sites included in the collection are: Knole, Ightham Mote, Beaulieu Abbey, Fountains Abbey, Portchester Castle, Rievaulx Abbey, Salisbury Cathedral, Netley Abbey, Lincoln Cathedral, Pevensey Castle, Peterborough Cathedral, Stonehenge, Ely Cathedral, Penshurst Place, Bolton Priory Kenilworth Castle, Bodiam Castle and St Mary’s Abbey York.

A number of images are un-located: some showing only vegetation or geological features; also some images of timber-framed houses and other dwellings.

While original prints are known to exist, there are one hundred and seventy-four mounted prints created in the 1960s and thirty-one copy negatives.

A handlist is available.

Archival History

The negatives are attributed to Henry Taylor (fl. 1851-1891), a chemist and photographer. He lived and worked in Godalming, Surrey, in the 1850s and is recorded as living in Aylesbury, Buckinghamshire in 1871, and London in 1881 and 1891. He died in Reigate, Surrey.

The negatives were given to the NMR in 1960 by Mrs. A.M. Hopkins, widow of Ernest Hopkins.

An incomplete set of copy photographs of the negatives is available as part of this collection and some of the gaps are filled by copy photographs in the open access Red Box Collection at the NMR. These include copies of negatives with references: DD62/00024, DD73/00068, DD76/00180 and DD92/00001.

Content

Rights

Source: Historic England Archive