Currently for sale on eBay is what the vendor believes may well be the earliest surviving piece of Daguerreian jewellery, a silver medallion, which measures c. 83 mm. x 63 mm. The images are the copyright of the vendor Robert Drapkin and are reproduced here with his kind permission.
According to the inscription the medallion was presented to Brother John Birch in open lodge on 22nd December 1840. It was intended “as a tribute of respect and to testify the high sense they entertain of his Musical Talent and Gentlemanly bearing”.
The photographer is not named, so who might it be? There are a couple of likely contenders, though other members may have additional suggestions.
The early date predates the opening of Beard’s studio at the Royal Polytechnic Institution in March 1841. It places the medallion in the period when the English patent rights were controlled by patent agent Miles Berry, and before he assigned them to Richard Beard in June / July 1841.
1840 was still an experimental period when improvements were being sought to the apparatus, lenses and the chemical process to reduce exposure times. Exposure times were initially measured in minutes, so most early daguerreotypes were landscape views, initially from abroad, however, by the summer of 1840 English views were being exhibited. The exhibition by Messrs Claudet and Houghton in November 1840 included London views as well as “portraits from nature and figures from the living model”. Although Antoine Claudet had obtained a licence to take daguerreotypes in England directly from Daguerre in 1839, in March 1840 he felt obliged to purchase a limited licence from Berry which allowed him to make and sell daguerreotypes. Claudet subsequently won the case that Beard brought against him.
It is also known that during the summer and autumn of 1840 Richard Beard and John Goddard were experimenting with a Wolcott mirror camera at Medical Hall, Holborn. Again Miles Berry threatened legal action and although they were using Wolcott’s ‘American camera and process’, Beard and Goddard paid Berry for the right to continue taking images. They were subsequently visited by a reporter from the Morning Chronicle who waxed lyrically about the sharpness of their portraits which had “a really astonishing appearance of life and reality”. Most of the portraits seen were the common size of miniatures, “while some were taken on plates not larger than a sixpence which are adapted for bracelets, lockets etc.”
The medallion records that John belonged to Lodge 19 of the Ancient Order of Druids which had been established in 1797. Their meetings were held in their Lodge Room at the Ram Inn, High Street, Uxbridge. A Brother Birch was one of those named in a report of their annual festival in April 1852, as was the host Brother William Trawley.
As to the man in the photograph, there seem to be a couple of options, depending on the perceived age of the sitter, 51 or 24. It looks like both men were members of AOD Lodge 19. So are we looking at John Birch (1789 – 1873) a tailor and draper, or his nephew John Trenly Birch (1816 – 1903). a Professor of Music, and the son of John’s younger brother William Henry? The musical connections suggest the latter, however, to me at least, the physiognomy suggests the former. Your thoughts and comments are welcomed.
