Hansons Auctioneers have two lots of photographic interest in its next library auction, one from the 1870s and the other from the 1930s. Lot two is a group of sixty-five prints from Thomas Child. The prints show China during the late-Qing dynasty (1870-1880). The lot is estimated at £2000-4000. The description reads:
Lot 2. CHILD, Thomas. Views of North China. EARLY PHOTOGRAPHY. A collection of 65 albumen prints ranging in size from 122mm x 187mm to 230mm x 343mm, 39 pasted on card album leaves, 26 loose or held in corner-mounts (i.e. not stuck down), 20 of the photographs bearing Thomas Child's signature in the negative and dated 1875-78, many accompanied by pasted captions & numbers, most images well-preserved, especially the loose examples, a few with creasing & wear, housed in a folio album bound in half crushed morocco, views include "Garden of Summer Palace, near Pekin", "White Cloud Temple, near Pekin", "Yuen-Ming-Yuen Palace, Pekin", "Ruins of Summer Palace, Pekin", "Camel-back Bridge, Pekin", "View of River from English Club, Shanghai", "The Bund, Shanghai", "Silver Island, Yang-tze-kiang River", "Tien-tsin, from River Pei-ho", "Steamer frozen in Peiho River", "Sedan-Chair and Bearers", several depicting mining operations, workers, incense & tea shops, street scenes, exteriors & interiors of temples, and others, plus one incongruous image of Llandudno. An important archive of early photography showing buildings and people in the Chinese city of Peking [now Beijing] during the late-Qing dynasty. [1870-80]
The preceeding lot includes an original glass plate negative by Hugh Cecil (1889-1974) of Edwards VIII in profile for the Royal Mint. With Edward's abidication in 1936 the coinage was scrapped. The lot comes with provenance.
The Library Auction
Hanson Auctioneers
2-26 February 2025
Online
See lot 2 here and lot 1 here
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