3-100-778 - "Royal Academy of Arts, London"/Heritage Images

Sir John Herschel (from life), 1867. Photogravure printed by H.H.H. Cameron and his partner J.C. Smith from negatives by Julia Margaret Cameron for the publication "Alfred, Lord Tennyson And His Friends". In the introduction, Cameron quotes from his mother's memoir "Annals of my Glasshouse". ' When I have had these men before my camera my whole soul has endeavoured to do its duty towards them in recording faithfully the greatness of the inner as well as the features of the outer man. The photograph thus taken has been almost the embodiment of a prayer. Most devoutedly was this feeling present to me when I photographed my illustrious and revered, as well as beloved, friend [astronomer, mathematician and experimental photographer] Sir John Herschel [1792-1871]. He was to me as a teacher and high priest; from my earliest girlhood I had loved and honoured him, and it was after a friendship extending over thirty-one years that the high task of giving his portrait to the nation was allotted to me.' From "A Series of 25 Portraits and Frontispiece In Photogravure From The Negatives Of Mrs. Julia Margaret Cameron And H.H.H. Cameron Reminiscences By Anne Thackeray Ritchie With Introduction By H.H. Hay Cameron" - [London: 1893]