[ABOVE] A photographic portrait, believed to be the artist George Azariah Lloyd (1821-1900). [ PICTURE: Courtesy of  Janey Haselden ]

George Azariah Lloyd was born at 2 Queen Street, Westminster, London on 25th March 1821, the son of Mary Ann and James Lloyd, a carpenter and builder. George was baptised at St James's Church, Westminster, some ten months later on 13th January 1822. George had at least two siblings - Mary Ann Lloyd (born 1818, Westminster) and Frederick Edwin Lloyd (born 1824, Westminster). In 1846, George Lloyd sired a son, who was named George Azariah Lloyd after his father. George Azariah Lloyd junior was born in Staines, Middlesex on 19th September 1846. On George junior's birth certificate, George Azariah Lloyd's's occupation is given as "Artist". A couple of years later, on 4th December 1848, George Azariah Lloyd married fellow artist Elizabeth Clark (born c1827, Coventry, Warwickshire) in the city of Bristol. Elizabeth Clark was the daughter of Elizabeth and John Carter Clark, a watchmaker from Coventry and was Christened in Coventry on 24th February, 1828. On their marriage certificate, George Lloyd and his bride Elizabeth Clark are both described as artists.

George Azariah Lloyd earned a living by making portraits either by painting or, more usually, by cutting profiles from black paper. As a young man, George Lloyd was a travelling artist. In the mid 1840s, George was working as an artist in the London area. At the time of his marriage in 1848, George Lloyd was in Bristol. A son, William Lloyd, was born in 1849, when George and Elizabeth were living at Lichfield in Staffordshire. By 1850, the Lloyds were back in the Bristol area. A daughter named Elizabeth Lloyd was born at Clevedon, near Bristol around this time. When the 1851 census was taken, George Lloyd and his family were recorded at an address in Plymouth St Andrew in Devon. George A. Lloyd is described as an "Artist" on the 1851 census return. By 1853, the Lloyds had returned to Somerset and had made their home in the district of Bedminster, one mile south of the city of Bristol. Mary Ann Lloyd was born at Bedminster in 1853 and another daughter, Emily Lloyd was born at Regent Road, Bedminster in 1856. By 1861, George Lloyd and his family were living in London, where a son Thomas Lloyd was born. The 1861 census records George Lloyd and his family at 22 Princes Row, Westminster, London. George Lloyd gives his profession as "Artist" and his wife Elizabeth is described as a "Nurse". Six children are listed on the 1861 census return - George (junior), aged 14, William, aged 12, young Elizabeth, aged 10, Mary Ann, aged 8, Emily, aged 5, and baby Thomas.

 

[ABOVE] Profile portraits by George Azariah Lloyd (c1866). Lloyd produced silhouette likenesses cut from black paper as well as photographic portraits. [ABOVE RIGHT] The Trade Label of George Azariah Lloyd, which declared he was a "Royal Artist " residing at 10 Bedford Buildings, Bedford Street, Brighton (c1866). In 1938, the Brighton & Hove Herald reported that George Azariah Lloyd, was "a notable character in Brighton", noting that he "was known as the ‘Royal Artist’ of the Chain Pier, and was commissioned to go to London and paint the portraits of Queen Victoria and members of the Royal Family." 

G. A. Lloyd in Brighton

After a period as an itinerant artist, George Azariah Lloyd settled in the Sussex seaside resort of Brighton around 1863. G. A. Lloyd is recorded as a profile artist based at 10 Bedford Buildings, Bedford Street, Brighton. George A. Lloyd was one of several artists who worked as profilists or silhouette cutters on Brighton's Chain Pier in the mid 19th century. It appears that Lloyd was creating "profiles" on the Chain Pier in the mid 1860s, but, by 1868, he added photography to his more traditional portrait making skills. G. A. Lloyd is listed as a "Photographic Artist" at 3a Chain Pier, Brighton in 1868 and 1869. George Azariah Lloyd was probably still living in Brighton in the early Summer of 1869, when the marriage of his son George Lloyd junior took place in the town. [George Azariah Lloyd (junior) married widow Mrs Jane Angelina Brown in Brighton on 5th July 1869].

By early August 1869, George Azariah Lloyd was working in the seaside resort of Littlehampton and in the first ever issue of The Littlehampton News, dated 7th August 1869, he placed the following advertisement :

[ABOVE] Chain Pier, Brighton (c1870). A photograph taken from the head of the Chain Pier looking through the arched towers to the Esplanade and Marine Parade. At the base of the iron towers on the Chain Pier were small booths and kiosks, selling gifts and refreshments. The Chain Pier towers were favourite locations for profilists and silhouette artists. In the late 1820s, John Gapp was operating from the "Third Tower" cutting full-length portraits from black paper. The profilist Edward Haines was working from one of the towers on the Chain Pier from 1845 to 1859. George Azariah Lloyd was cutting profiles from Tower No 3 around the time this photograph was taken.

[ABOVE] Profile portrait by George Azariah Lloyd. [ PICTURE: Courtesy of  Janey Haselden ]

[ABOVE] Profile portraits of two children by George Azariah Lloyd (c1866).

[ABOVE] Carte-de-visite portrait by George Azariah Lloyd (c1873).

The 1881 census records George Lloyd, a widower, living at the Lambeth home of his younger brother Frederick Edwin Lloyd (born 1824, Westminster), who had also recently lost his wife, Emma Lloyd (c1834-1879). Frederick Edwin Lloyd (entered as Edwin Lloyd on the census return), the Head of Household at 2 Newport Street, Lambeth, was employed as a maker of gas lamp shades and was providing for four motherless children, whose ages ranged from ten to two. George Azariah Lloyd is described on the census return as an "Artist in Paintings", aged 60.

While living in London, George Azariah Lloyd made the acquaintance of a widow named Ann Newton, who was eventually became his second wife. George married Ann Newton on 24th December 1884 at St Andrew's Church, Canal Road, Hoxton, in the London district of Shoreditch. On the marriage certificate, sixty-three year old George gives his profession as "Portrait Painter".

George Lloyd eventually returned to live in Brighton, accompanied by his new wife. Towards the end of his life, George Lloyd lived at 4 Sussex Terrace, Brighton. Early in 1900, George Lloyd was admitted to the Infirmary attached to the Brighton Workhouse in Elm Grove. George Azariah Lloyd died of bronchitis and bladder cancer in the Workhouse Infirmary on 11th February 1900, at the age of 79.

Acknowledgements

Thanks to Janey Haselden and Chris Lloyd  for supplying family history information concerning the photographer and artist George Azariah Lloyd. Janey Haselden is the great, great grand-daughter of George Azariah Lloyd. Janey's great grandmother was Mary Ann Lloyd (born 1853, Bedminster, Bristol), G. A. Lloyd's second eldest daughter. Thanks also to Peter Merett  for providing the details of the advertisement for G. A. Lloyd , Photographer and Profilist, which appeared in The Littlehampton News.