Hastings Photographers (Newcombe)

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Professional Photographers in Hastings

Charles Thomas Newcombe of London and Hastings

The photographic career of Charles Thomas Newcombe with additional information on his brothers Frederick Thomas Newcombe and Samuel Prout Newcombe, together with an account of The London School of Photography, The London Portrait Company and members of the Newcombe, Prout,and Smorthwaite Families.

Charles Thomas NEWCOMBE (born 1830, London)

[ABOVE] A detail of a modern map showing the Clerkenwell district of London, where the Newcombe Family were based in the middle of the 19th Century. In 1852, Frederick Newcombe was running a "ham and beef" shop in Theberton Street, Islington [bordered in red in the map above].

Charles Thomas Newcombe was born in London on 18th September 1830 and christened at The Claremont Independent Chapel in Pentonville on 12th December 1830. Charles Thomas Newcombe was one of several children born to Hannah Prout (1795-1842) and Frederick Newcombe (c1794-c1853), at least three of whom became associated with professional photography.

Frederick Newcombe, Charles' father, was born around 1794 in Bodmin, Cornwall. On 11th November 1821, at the Charles Church in Plymouth Devon, Frederick Newcombe married Hannah Prout (born 1795, Devonport, Devon). After their marriage, the West Country couple moved to London, where Frederick Newcombe, a butcher by trade, set up a "ham and beef" shop. During her twenty year marriage to Frederick Newcombe, Mary Prout gave birth to at least 8 children - Frederick Thomas Newcombe (born 1822), Samuel Prout Newcombe (born c1824, London), Cornelius Prout Newcombe (born 1825, London), Ebenezer Prout Newcombe (born 1828, London), Charles Thomas Newcombe (born1830, London), Hannah Marie Newcombe (born 1832, Clerkenwell, London), Mary Anne "Minnie" Newcombe (born 1834, London) and Eliza Newcombe (born 1836, Clerkenwell, London). Mrs Hannah Newcombe died in Islington, London, on 23rd August 1842, a few days after her 47th birthday. On 27th December 1843, Frederick Newcombe married his second wife, a widow named Mrs Sarah Watson. By this date, Frederick Newcombe was working in the meat trade at No.1 Theberton Street, Islington. In the 1852 edition of the Post Office Directory of London, Frederick Newcombe senior is listed as a "ham & beef dealer" at 1 Theberton Street, Islington. Another Frederick Newcombe, presumably Frederick Newcombe senior's eldest son, is recorded as a "meat salesman" at London's Newgate Market in the same trade directory. Frederick Newcombe senior died in London in 1853 or 1854. [ Michael Mates, who is descended from Frederick's youngest daughter Eliza Newcombe (1836-1896) believes Frederick Newcombe senior died in London on 11th October 1853, but the death of another Frederick Newcombe is recorded in the London district of Clerkenwell during the 4th Quarter of 1854].

The Newcombe Brothers and Early Photography in London

England's first photographic portrait studio was opened by Richard Beard (1801-1885) at the Royal Polytechnic Institution, 309 Regent Street, London on 23rd March 1841. For the first dozen years, the production of photographic portraits in London was dominated by Richard Beard, who was the sole patentee of the daguerreotype process and therefore held a virtual monopoly in the production of portraits using Daguerre's method of photography. Richard Beard's patent of the daguerreotype process expired on 14th August 1853. A few years earlier Frederick Scott Archer (1813-1857) had published details of his "wet collodion" process, whereby a glass negative could make an unlimited number of photographic prints on paper. The end of Richard Beard's stranglehold on portrait photography and the introduction of Frederick Scott Archer's "wet collodion" process led to a rapid increase in the number of photographic portrait studios in London. At the time of the 1851 census, less than a dozen inhabitants of London described themselves as professional photographers (described variously on census returns as 'Photographer', 'Photographic Artist', 'Daguerreotype Artist' and 'Talbotype Artist'). By 1855, there were over a hundred establishments in London producing photographic likenesses. An analysis of the 1861 census returns for London revealed that there were 284 persons working as photographic artists in the capital. When the census was taken on 7th April 1861, three of the five Newcombe brothers - Frederick Thomas Newcombe, Samuel Prout Newcombe and Charles Thomas Newcombe were earning a living through professional photography.

Around 1853, Samuel Prout Newcombe (1824-1912), a former Islington schoolmaster, established The London School of Photography, a photographic portrait studio, at 78 Newgate Street, London. During the 1850s, there was a growing interest in obtaining photographic likenesses and, such was the demand in London, that Samuel Prout Newcombe was encouraged to open a chain of photographic portrait studios across the capital. By 1860, Samuel Prout Newcombe had opened branches of The London School of Photography in Regent Street, Oxford Street, the City of London and in his home territory of Upper Street, Islington. With the increasing popularity of the carte-de-visite, a small format of photographic portrait first introduced from France in 1857, Samuel Prout Newcombe established a few more studios in central London. By 1865, Samuel Prout Newcombe was the owner of six studios in London and two branches of  The London School of Photography in Liverpool and Manchester.

Early in 1857, Samuel Prout Newcombe had purchased Mrs Maria Clarke's photographic portrait studio at 1 Market Place, Manchester. It appears that Samuel  Newcombe might have recruited his younger brother Charles Thomas Newcombe (born 1830, London) to manage the Manchester branch of the The London School of Photography, as Charles was living in Manchester, when he married Mary Birchall in 1857. [ Charles Thomas Newcombe married Mary Birchall (born c1832, Wellingborough, Northants.) at Manchester Cathedral on 9th May 1857 ]. In 1858, Charles Thomas Newcombe returned to London to set up his own photographic portrait studio at 135 Fenchurch Street, London.

In 1863, Frederick Thomas Newcombe (1822-1882), Frederick Newcombe senior's eldest son, possibly inspired by his brothers' success in commercial photography, found employment with The London Portrait Company, a photographic firm which specialised in the production of carte-de-visite portraits. Carte-de-visite portraits produced at the London Portrait Company studio at 68 Cheapside, London  between 1864 and 1867 carry the credit "Conducted by F. T. Newcombe".

Charles Thomas Newcombe - Photographer with Studios in London & Hastings

Charles Thomas Newcombe set up his own photographic portrait studio at 135 Fenchurch Street, London in 1858. Such was the demand for carte-de-visite portraits, Charles Newcombe was obliged to make extensive alterations and improvements to his premises during March 1861. A second studio was required and on 18th June 1862, Charles Newcombe opened a second studio in London at 109 Regent Street. At the end of April 1863, Charles Newcombe established a branch studio in the Sussex seaside town of Hastings. A fourth photographic studio was constructed at Coleherne Court in the Earl's Court district of Kensington. According to The Times newspaper, a large glasshouse was erected at Coleherne Court to create a light-filled studio for portraiture. As was customary for the time, a portion of the studio was furnished with drapes, tables and chairs to resemble a drawing room. [ see the illustration below, showing a typical carte-de-visite portrait studio ].

Charles Thomas Newcombe might have overstretched himself financially because in 1865 he began to contract his business operations. By the end of 1865, Newcombe had passed his London Regent Street studio to his former business partner Edgar Prout (born 1839, London), sold the Hastings branch studio at 22 White Rock Place to Henry William Ashdown (born 1844, St Pancras, London) and closed the recently constructed studio at Coleherne Court, Kensington.

Charles Thomas Newcombe retained ownership of his original photographic studio at 135 Fenchurch Street in the City of London. Newcombe remained at No 135 Fenchurch Street until 1872, when he moved his studio to premises a few doors away at 129 Fenchurch Street, City of London.

The Photographic Portrait Studios of Charles Thomas Newcombe 1858-1874

135 Fenchurch Street, City of London

1858 - 1872

 
109 Regent Street, London 1862 - 1865

passed to Edgar Prout

22 White Rock Place, Hastings, Sussex

1863 - 1865

passed to Henry William Ashdown

Coleherne Court, Earl's Court, Kensington

1864 - 1865

 
129 Fenchurch Street, City of London.

1872 - 1874

passed to Andrew & George Taylor

[ABOVE] The trade plate of Charles Thomas Newcombe of 135 Fenchurch Street, London, taken from the reverse of carte-de-visite portrait (c1862).

[ABOVE] The trade plate of The London School of Photography taken from the reverse of carte-de-visite portrait (c1865). The proprietor of the company is  named as "Mr. S. Prout Newcombe". A former school teacher of Islington, Samuel Prout  Newcombe founded The London School of Photography in 1853.

[ABOVE] The trade plate of The London Portrait Company taken from the reverse of carte-de-visite portrait (c1865). The photographic studio at 68 Cheapside, London was "Conducted by F. T. Newcombe". The photographer Frederick Thomas Newcombe managed The London Portrait Company between 1864 and 1867.

[ABOVE] The trade plate of Charles Thomas Newcombe of 109 Regent Street, London, taken from the reverse of carte-de-visite portrait (c1865).

[ABOVE] A carte-de-visite portrait produced by Charles Thomas Newcombe at his Regent Street studio in London, taken when C. T. Newcombe was running studios at 109 Regent Street and 135 Fenchurch Street, London and at 22 White Rock Place, Hastings(c1865).
 

Charles Thomas Newcombe and the Carte-de-visite Portrait Photograph

[ABOVE] The interior of a typical carte-de-visite portrait studio in the 1860s. The photographer is using a special multi-lens camera which could take between four to a dozen small portraits on a single glass negative. The camera in the middle foreground shows four apertures which correspond to the four lenses of the carte-de-visite camera. A woman poses in front of a mock-up of a drawing room in a grand house, complete with a cardboard fireplace and a fake ancestral portrait on the painted backdrop. On the far right of the illustration is an alternative studio portrait setting - an artificial balustrade in front of a magnificent countryside view featuring trees and a church spire. In front of this illusory view are two posing stands, complete with head clamps, which were used to keep a subject still during lengthy exposure times. The large windows and skylight provides the photographer with the required amount of natural light.

By 1862, the carte-de-visite portrait  had become a fashionable and popular format of photography. Cartes-de-visite were small photographic paper prints on card mounts the same size as conventional visiting cards (roughly 21/2 inches by 41/4 inches or 6.3 cm by 10.5 cm). This photograph format originated in France and so a small portrait mounted on card came to be known as a 'carte-de-visite', the French term for visiting card.

ABOVE] A carte-de-visite portrait of an unknown man photographed in front of a painted backdrop and a fake balustrade. This carte-de-visite portrait was produced by Charles Thomas Newcombe at his Fenchurch Street studio in London around 1862, when C. T. Newcombe was running a single studio at 135 Fenchurch Street, City of London (c1862). No negative number is given on the reverse of the carte, but it is reported that C. T. Newcombe had taken over 7,000 photographic portraits by 1862. [ABOVE] A woman photographed standing on a patterned carpet and posed beside a chair and draped curtain to simulate the appearance of a drawing room setting. A carte-de-visite portrait  produced by Charles Thomas Newcombe at his Fenchurch Street studio in London, taken when C. T. Newcombe was  running studios at 135 Fenchurch Street and 109 Regent Street in London. (c1863). Negative No. 15,341. It is reported that by December 1865,  C. T. Newcombe had taken over 46,000 cdv portraits, disposing of 10,000 negatives.

 

Charles Thomas Newcombe (born 1830, London)

Charles Thomas Newcombe was born in London on 18th September 1830 and christened at The Claremont Independent Chapel in Pentonville on 12th December 1830. Charles Thomas Newcombe was the youngest son of Hannah Prout and Frederick Newcombe, a meat dealer who originated from the West Country of England.

Charles Thomas Newcombe trained as a photographer as a young man and in the mid-1850s he worked as an assistant photographer in Sheffield and Lower Clapton in East London. Newcombe then found work as an "Assistant to a Photographer" in Manchester. ( In 1857, Samuel Prout Newcombe, Charles Newcombe's brother, had purchased a photographic studio in Manchester, so it is possible that Charles was in Manchester to help his older sibling). In 1857, Charles Thomas Newcombe was residing at 113 Great Ducie Street, Manchester. On 9th May 1857, Charles Thomas Newcombe married Mary Birchall (born c1832, Wellingborough, Northants.) at Manchester Cathedral. Shortly after their marriage, Charles and Mary Newcombe moved to the Clifton district of Bristol where he was "engaged as an Assistant to a Photographer". Charles Newcombe worked as a photographer in Clifton, Bristol, for about 9 months, before being declared an "insolvent debtor" in May 1858.

In the Spring of 1858, Charles Thomas Newcombe returned to London to set up his own photographic portrait studio at 135 Fenchurch Street, London. In 1859, Charles Newcombe's wife Mary gave birth to a baby daughter named Ethel Newcombe. [The birth of Ethel Newcombe was registered in the London district of Islington during the 2nd Quarter of 1859].

When the 1861 census was taken Charles Thomas Newcombe, his wife Mary and baby Ethel were residing in the living quarters attached to Newcombe's photographic studio at 135 Fenchurch Street, London. The following year, Charles Thomas Newcombe opened a second studio at 109 Regent Street, London. In April 1863, Charles Thomas Newcombe opened a branch studio in the Sussex seaside resort of Hastings. (See below).

Charles Thomas Newcombe was assisted in his London photography business by a relative named Edgar Prout (born 1839, London), a son of the artist and lithographer John Skinner Prout (1805-1876). Edgar Prout was brought into the business as a partner in 1865 and in February 1866, Prout took over the running of Newcombe's studio in Regent Street.

Charles Thomas Newcombe achieved some success as a portrait photographer. After exhibiting some studies at an Exhibition of Photographs and Daguerreotypes mounted by the Photographic Society of London in January 1861, Charles Newcombe went on to exhibit his photographic portraits at the International Exhibition held in South Kensington in 1862. Charles Thomas Newcombe is also listed as an exhibitor of "Photographic Portraits" at The Paris Universal Exhibition of 1867.

Charles Thomas Newcombe  listed as an exhibitor of "Photographic Portraits" in the Catalogue of the Paris Universal Exhibition  published in 1867.

Today, the photographic work of Charles Thomas Newcombe is held by London's National Portrait Gallery, the Victoria & Albert Museum and The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York. The National Portrait Gallery has two photographic portraits by Charles Thomas Newcombe; one depicting William George Tozer (1829-1899), the Bishop of Honduras, the other portraying William Ward Jackson (1805-1874), a clergyman and Justice of the Peace. The Newcombe photographs in the V & A Museum come from the Guy Little Collection of Theatrical Photographs and feature famous actors and actresses of the day, including the playwright and comedian John Baldwin Buckstone (1802-1879), the comic actors Paul John Bedford (1792-1871) and John Lawrence Toole (1830-1906), Alice Seaman (born c1844) and Henrietta Simms (died 1887).

The 1871 census records Charles Thomas Newcombe and his family at 68 Graham Road, Hackney, London. There were now two children in the Newcombe household - eleven year old Ethel and four year old Charles. (Charles and Mary Newcombe's second child, a boy named Charles F. Newcombe, was born in London towards the end of 1866. Although Charles Newcombe junior later declared that he was born in Holloway, North London, his birth was registered in the St James' district of Westminster during the 4th Quarter of 1866).

[ABOVE] Charles Thomas Newcombe, a "Photographer" of No. 1 Victoria Place, Hotwells, Bristol, declared "an insolvent debtor" in The London Gazette newspaper (7th May 1858).

[ABOVE] The trade plate of Charles Thomas Newcombe of 135 Fenchurch Street, London, taken from the reverse of carte-de-visite portrait (c1862).

[ABOVE] A carte-de-visite portrait of a seated man photographed at the Fenchurch Street studio of C. T. Newcombe (c1870). Charles Thomas Newcombe operated the photographic portrait studio at 135 Fenchurch Street, London, from 1858 until 1872. Negative No. 57,116.

 

Charles Thomas Newcombe in Hastings

[ABOVE] An advertisements placed in the Hastings & St Leonards Chronicle on  6th May 1863 by Charles Thomas Newcombe who was announcing the opening of his photographic portrait studio at 22 White Rock, Hastings.

[ABOVE] An advertisements placed in the Hastings & St Leonards Chronicle on 15th April 1863, in which Charles Thomas Newcombe announced that he would shortly be opening a photographic studio at 22 White Rock, Hastings. Newcombe's Hastings studio was opened to the public by the beginning of May 1863. [ABOVE] One of the advertisements that Charles Thomas Newcombe placed in the Hastings & St Leonards News in January 1865 in which he promoted his instantaneous portraits of children. (Hastings & St Leonards News, 3rd January 1865). Charles Thomas Newcombe opened his Hastings branch studio at 22 White Rock Place, Hastings in April 1863. Three years later, C. T. Newcombe sold the studio to Henry William Ashdown.
   

Photographic Studios at White Rock Place, Hastings

In April 1863, Charles Thomas Newcombe, described in a local newspaper as a "Photographist of 109 Regent Street and 135 Fenchurch Street, London", opened a photographic portrait studio at 22 White Rock Place, Hastings The parade of business premises between numbers 20 to 25 at White Rock Place became particularly well served with photographic studios after 1863. By the Summer of 1864, James S. Bayfield (1830-1908) had opened a customised photographic portrait studio at 25 White Rock Place. When in 1866, Charles Thomas Newcombe closed his Hastings branch and sold the studio to Henry William Ashdown, the twenty-two year old son of William Ashdown, the proprietor of a 'fancy bazaar' at 29 White Rock Place. Newcombe's former studio manager, Robert Nayler opened his own establishment at 21 White Rock Place, Hastings around 1866.

White Rock Place is situated on Hastings seafront between Eversfield Place and Verulam Place in the west and Robertson Street and Carlisle Parade in the east. Originally, 'The White Rock' was a natural feature on the seafront and was used as a gun emplacement during the Napoleonic War. Between 1834 and 1835, the cliffs near White Rock were levelled and a new coast road was made, including a stretch which became known as White Rock Place. Given the prime location of White Rock Place, the buildings that overlooked the seafront were soon populated by seaside lodging houses and businesses that could be guaranteed custom from visiting holiday makers.

Unsurprisingly, White Rock Place became a favourite location for portrait photographers. Over a period of twenty-five years, seven different photographic studios were based at 22 White Rock Place.

[ABOVE] White Rock Place, Hastings, photographed around the time Charles Thomas Newcombe was operating a photographic portrait studio at No.22 White Rock Place. Newcombe's studio premises is at the far end of this parade of shops , immediately to the right of the group of men in the left-hand corner of the picture.

[ABOVE] A modern photograph taken in 2008, showing No. 21 and No. 22 White Rock Place, Hastings. When this photograph was taken, the site of Charles Newcombe's former photographic studio at No. 22 White Rock Place was occupied by the Scope charity shop. Around 1865, Robert Nayler, who was the Manager of Charles Newcombe's studio opened a rival studio next door at No. 21 White Rock Place, Hastings.

[ABOVE] A modern photograph taken in 2008, showing the same parade of shops at White Rock Place as the one featured in the Victorian photograph above. This parade of shops are numbered 21-27, beginning with the shop at No. 21 with the red & white banner on the balcony. [ See a close-up view of No. 21 & 22 White Rock in the photo opposite ]. This parade of shops faces the Hastings seafront, not far from Hastings Pier.

 
Click on the link below to view examples of the photographic work produced at the Hastings studio owned by Charles Thomas Newcombe between 1863 and 1865:

Charles Thomas Newcombe of Hastings - Photographic Gallery

 

[ABOVE] A carte-de-visite portrait of a seated man photographed at the Fenchurch Street studio of C. T. Newcombe (c1870). Charles Thomas Newcombe operated the photographic portrait studio at 135 Fenchurch Street, London, from 1858 until 1872. Negative No. 56, 254.

The 1870s witnessed a decline in Charles Thomas Newcombe's fortunes. In 1864, Charles Thomas Newcombe had owned four photographic portrait studios, three in London and one in the Sussex seaside resort of Hastings By the start of 1873, Charles Thomas Newcombe was operating a single photographic studio on the 2nd floor of 129 Fenchurch Street in the City of London. At the end of 1873, Charles Newcombe sold his Fenchurch Street studio to A. & G. Taylor, a large photographic firm owned by two Scottish brothers, Andrew Taylor (born 1832, Aberdeen) and George Taylor (born 1839, Aberdeen).

In 1875,Charles Newcombe's wife, Mrs Mary Newcombe, died in Islington, London, at the age of 43, leaving her husband to bring up two children. At the time of Mary Newcombe's death, Ethel Newcombe was 15 years of age and her young brother Charles Newcombe junior was an eight year old schoolboy.

The 1881 census records Charles T. Newcombe, described on the census return as a fifty year old widower, employed as a "Photographer", living alone at 44 Birkbeck Road, London. Both of Charles Newcombe's children were living in the Liverpool area of Lancashire at the time of the 1881 census. The 1881 census shows twenty-one year old Ethel Newcombe, described on the census return as an "Artist - Portrait Painter", as the Head of Household at 36 River Avon Street, Toxteth Park, Lancashire. Living at the same address was Ethel's younger brother, Charles F. Newcombe, a 14 year old schoolboy, and Ethel's nineteen year old cousin Rose Howes, who was employed as Miss Newcombe's "Housekeeper". Ethel Newcombe later followed in her father's footsteps and became a professional photographer. A trade directory of 1886 shows Miss Ethel Newcombe as the proprietor of a photographic portrait studio at 114 Bold Street, Liverpool. Ethel later abandoned photography for a vocation in nursing. When the census was taken in 1901, Ethel Newcombe was recorded as a hospital nurse in Loughton, Essex. In the same census, Charles F. Newcombe is shown as a librarian working in Hampstead, London.

David Webb, the London photo-historian, has suggested on the photoLondon website that Charles Thomas Newcombe died in Croydon, Surrey, in 1912. However, other evidence indicates that the person who died in Croydon was a much younger man who shared the same name - Charles Thomas Newcombe (born 1847, Exeter, Devon), a commercial traveller who died in Croydon in 1912, aged 64. [Charles Thomas Newcombe would have been 82 in 1912]. I can find no sign of Charles Thomas Newcombe in any of the census returns compiled at 10 year intervals after 1881. The fact that Charles Thomas Newcombe is not recorded in the 1891 Census of England & Wales suggests that he died sometime between 1881 and 1891. Some members of the Newcombe family made new lives in Australia, but it is unlikely that Charles Thomas Newcombe emigrated during this period given his age and the fact that his children remained in England.

 

Click on the link below to view examples of the photographic work produced by Charles Thomas Newcombe at his London studios:

Charles Thomas Newcombe of London - Photographic Gallery

 

Frederick Thomas Newcombe (born 1822, Southwark, South London)

Frederick Thomas Newcombe was born in South London on 11th August 1822 and baptised at Lady Huntingdon's Surrey Chapel, Blackfriars Road, Southwark, on 3rd January 1823. Frederick Thomas Newcombe was the eldest of eight children born to Hannah Prout and Frederick Newcombe senior, a London meat dealer who originated from Cornwall.

Frederick Newcombe senior, Frederick's father, was born around 1794 in Bodmin, Cornwall. After marrying Hannah Prout (born 1795, Devonport, Devon) in Plymouth in 1821, the West Country couple moved to London, where Frederick Newcombe, a butcher by trade, set up a meat business, eventually establishing a "ham and beef" shop in the Clerkenwell district of London.

Around 1851, Frederick Newcombe was working in the meat trade at No.1 Theberton Street, Islington. In the 1852 edition of the Post Office Directory of London, Frederick Newcombe senior is listed as a "ham & beef dealer" at 1 Theberton Street, Islington. In the same London directory, another Frederick Newcombe is recorded as a "meat salesman" at London's Newgate Market. When the 1852 directory was compiled the previous year, Frederick Thomas Newcombe would have been 29 years of age and, given that his father was also engaged in the meat trade, it seems reasonable to assume that Frederick Newcombe junior had become a meat salesman in a neighbouring district of London.

[ABOVE] Frederick Newcombe and Frederick Newcombe senior listed in the 1852 edition of the Post Office Directory of London. Both Frederick Newcombe and Frederick Newcombe senior were engaged in the meat trade at this time.

On 10th September 1851, Frederick Thomas Newcombe married Marianne Ward (born c1816, London, Middlesex) at St Marylebone's Church, London.

Around the beginning of 1863, Frederick Thomas Newcombe established a photographic portrait studio at 68 Cheapside in the City of London. The studio, which was situated on the 3rd floor of the building, went under the name of The London Portrait Company. Carte-de-visite portraits produced at the Cheapside studio between 1863 and 1865 are printed with the words "The London Portrait Company, 68 Cheapside, E.C. - Conducted by F. T. Newcombe", but it is not clear whether this signifies that Frederick Thomas Newcombe was the owner or the manager of The London Portrait Company. In February 1863, The London Portrait Company was charging 10s 6d for ten carte-de-visite portraits at its Cheapside studio. (On 6th February 1863, it was announced that The London Portrait Company would shortly open a studio at 63 St Paul's Churchyard, London).

It appears that in addition to standard arte-de-visite portraits, The London Portrait Company specialised in the production of cartes-de-visite featuring actors and actresses. In its photography collection, The National Portrait Gallery has two portraits by The London Portrait Company and both depict scenes from a play entitled "The Hunchback" (1832) by the Irish dramatist James Sheridan Knowles (1784-1862). The two cartes-de-visite, credited to Frederick Thomas Newcombe, depict the actor John Billington (c1829-1904) and the actress Henrietta Simms (died 1887), in stage costume, performing scenes from an 1865 production of the "The Hunchback", with Billington taking the part of "Modus" and Miss Simms in the role of "Helen". The photographs date from January-March 1865 when the play was being staged at the Adelphi Theatre, London. An advertisement in The Times, dated 3rd April 1865, announced that cartes-de-visite of "Miss Henrietta Simms as 'Constance' in 'The Love Chase' and 'Helen' in 'The Hunchback', with Mr Billington as 'Modus' " had just been published by the "London Portrait Company (conducted by F. T. Newcombe)".

Frederick Thomas Newcombe ended his association with The London Portrait Company sometime during 1865. From 1866 until 1875, the manager of the London Portrait Company was Francis Gilling (born c1835), who was described as "formerly manager with the London Stereoscopic & Photographic Company". Frederick Newcombe's subsequent career is difficult to trace. In the 1881 census there is a fifty-eight widower named Frederick Newcombe living in S.E. London at 79 Albyn Road, Deptford. However, this Frederick Newcombe gives his place of birth as Hampshire and is recorded as an "instrument maker". The death of a 'Frederick Newcombe', aged 60, was recorded in the Southwark district of London during the 3rd Quarter of 1882, but it has not been established with certainty that this 'Frederick Newcombe' was the photographer who conducted The London Portrait Company between 1863 and 1865.

[ABOVE] The trade plate of The London Portrait Company taken from the reverse of carte-de-visite portrait (c1865). The photographic studio at 68 Cheapside, London was "Conducted by F. T. Newcombe". The photographer Frederick Thomas Newcombe managed The London Portrait Company between 1864 and 1867.

[ABOVE] A detail from a carte-de-visite portrait produced by The London Portrait Company at 68 Cheapside,  City of London. The photographer Frederick Thomas Newcombe managed The London Portrait Company between 1864 and 1867.
[ABOVE] An advertisement for The London Portrait Company of 68 Cheapside, London, E.C., which appeared in The Times newspaper on 6th February 1863. Conducted by Frederick Thomas Newcombe, the studio charged 10s 6d for ten carte-de-visite portraits. In the same newspaper it was announced that The London Portrait Company would shortly open a studio at 63 St Paul's Churchyard, London.
[ABOVE] An advertisement for The London Portrait Company of 68 Cheapside,  which appeared in The Times newspaper on 10th October 1863. Conducted by Frederick Thomas Newcombe, the studio offered "First-class portraits from 2s. 6d."and a set of ten carte-de-visite portraits for 10 shillings. Two dozen cartes-de-visite cost 21 shillings at Newcombe's studio.

 
 
 

 

Samuel Prout Newcombe  (c1824-1912)

Samuel Prout Newcombe was born in London around 1824, the second eldest son of Hannah Prout and Frederick Newcombe, a London meat dealer who originated from Cornwall. Samuel's mother Hannah Prout appears to have been a sister of the famous watercolour artist Samuel Prout (1783-1852). [See the section entitled "The Prout Family and the Newcombe Family of London" at the foot of this webpage ].

Samuel Prout Newcombe began his working life as a school teacher and, by 1852, he was the joint owner, with schoolmaster Howard Anderton (born c1828, London), of Priory House School, High Road, Lower Clapton, Hackney. In addition to being a school teacher, Samuel Prout Newcombe was noted as an author of educational books for children. Amongst the children's books he authored were Fireside Facts from the Great Exhibition (1851), Little Henry's Holiday at the Great Exhibition (1851) and, Pleasant Pages For Young People: Or Book Of Home Education And Entertainment (1853). From July 1850, Samuel Prout Newcombe edited a children's magazine entitled "Pleasant Pages", described as "a journal of home education based on the infant-school system".

Around 1853, Samuel Prout Newcombe made the acquaintance of a photographic artist named Charles William Quin. The two men entered into a business partnership and established The London School of Photography at 78 Newgate Street in the City of London. On 1st June 1854, Samuel Prout Newcombe and Charles William Quin placed an advertisement in The Times newspaper announcing that they would be opening the The London School of Photography at 78 Newgate Street, under the management of Mr. Quin, on 5th June 1854.  According to early advertisements, The London School of Photography was initially a teaching institution, providing instruction in the art and science of photography. A public notice in the journal "Notes & Queries", published on 10th June 1854, informed readers that "at this Institution, Ladies and Gentlemen may learn in One Hour to take Portraits and Landscapes". No charge was made for this training in photography. Visitors to The London School of Photography could also purchase "the necessary apparatus" to practise photography for the sum of five pounds (sterling). Newcombe and Quin also used their premises in Newgate Street as an exhibition area for photographic work. In 1854, the Journal of the Photographic Society announced that "photographers wishing to dispose of copies of their photographs may do so by putting them on sale at the London School of Photography, 78 Newgate St., where an exhibition of English and Foreign photographs will be opened early in June".

With the relaxation of the restrictions on commercial portrait photography in the mid 1850s, an opportunity was opened for Samuel Prout Newcombe and his business partner Charles William Quin to operate a photographic portrait studio at The London School of Photography premises in Newgate Street. By the end of the decade, the London School of Photography was offering to take "First-Class Portraits, on Paper, For Half-a-Crown (2s 6d)", providing six additional copies for 9 shillings.

Samuel Prout's new business venture was a great success. By 1857, Newcombe & Quin were operating four branches of the London School of Photography in the capital and another studio in Manchester. Between 1859 and 1862, The London School of Photography opened a further six new studios, five in London and another in Liverpool. A branch studio of the London School of Photography also operated in Sheffield for a short time.

During the early period of the firm's history, the studio photography side of the business was managed by S. Prout Newcombe's partner, Charles William Quin. Between 1854 and 1856, advertisements for The London School of Photography billed Charles Quin as the "Manager". The partnership of Samuel Prout Newcombe and Charles William Quin also submitted photographs to the Photographic Society of London's "Exhibition of Photographs and Daguerreotypes" held at 5 Pall Mall East, London, in January 1856. The exhibition catalogue lists nine exhibits by Newcombe & Quin. All the displayed pictures by Newcombe & Quin had been produced by Frederick Scott Archer's collodion process and, with the exception of one display entitled "Seven Views", all the photographs appear to have been portraits.

Charles William Quin's involvement with The London School of Photography after 1856 is not altogether clear. The next exhibition organised by the Photographic Society of London at the Pall Mall Gallery in 1857 featured work by Charles William Quin & Co., yet other sources suggest that Charles Quin continued to be associated with The London School of Photography in Newgate Street until 1859. It appears that Samuel Prout Newcombe and Charles William Quin went their separate ways around 1860. London trade directories published in 1860 and 1861, record Charles William Quin with his own photographic portrait studio at 51 Oxford Street, London.

By 1860, Samuel Prout Newcombe had become the sole proprietor of The London School of Photography. Samuel Prout Newcombe's control of the company coincided with "cartomania", the craze for obtaining small photographic portraits on card known as "cartes-de-visite. (See the section below entitled "Samuel Prout Newcombe and the Production of Carte-de-visite portraits at The London School of Photography"). By 1862, the carte-de-visite portrait had become the most fashionable and popular format of photography. The great demand for carte-de-visite portraits meant that Samuel Prout Newcombe could maintain a chain of photographic portrait studios across London, with additional branches in Liverpool and Manchester. In 1865, at the height of  "cartomania", Samuel Prout Newcombe owned eight photographic portrait studios carrying the London School of Photography sign. On 4th March 1867, Samuel Prout Newcombe opened a new branch studio at the Soho Bazaar, Soho Square, Oxford Street, the most successful and fashionable bazaar (shopping area) in London.

 

[ABOVE] The trade plate of The London School of Photography showing the Proprietor as Mr. S. Prout Newcombe (c1865). At this stage, Samuel Prout Newcombe owned 7 studios in London and one branch at 46 Church Street, Liverpool.

Samuel Prout Newcombe was in charge of The London School of Photography for 16 years, from the institution's foundation in June 1854 until Newcombe sold the photographic business to William Smorthwaite around 1870. At the beginning, The London School of Photography was managed by Charles William Quin, a professional photographer, and it is not clear whether Samuel Prout Newcombe was actively involved in the taking of photographic likenesses in the firm's portrait studios. It is likely that at the beginning, Samuel Prout Newcombe was an enthusiastic amateur photographer. The nephew of a famous watercolour artist, his namesake Samuel Prout (1783-1852), Samuel Prout Newcombe had an interest in landscape art and as early as June 1857, he was promoting the "Collodion Knapsack", a type of portable darkroom which enabled "photographers to obtain landscape sketches with the Collodion process". The "Collodion Knapsack" incorporated a "Packing Case, Camera, and Dark Chamber; and enables the Photographer to manipulate out of doors without the assistance of a tent". The "Collodion Knapsack", packed with photographic apparatus, including photographic plates, developing trays and bottles of chemicals, weighed about 18 pounds. Samuel Prout Newcombe wrote a two-part article, "Collodion Knapsack Sketches (Part 1 & Part 2), extolling the advantages of the portable darkroom in June 1857. The London School of Photography exhibited their version of the "Collodion Knapsack" at the International Exhibtion of 1862.

Although it is likely that Samuel Prout Newcombe was a keen photographer, particularly in the sphere of landscape photography, there is very little evidence that he regularly used a camera in the portrait studios operated by The London School of Photography. In most accounts of The London School of Photography, Samuel Prout Newcombe is referred to as the proprietor or owner of the studios rather than as a photographic artist in his own right.

[RIGHT] The watercolour artist Samuel Prout (1783-1852), the uncle and namesake of Samuel Prout Newcombe (c1824-1912).  The Newcombe family were proud of their connection with the famous topographical artist Samuel Prout and it seems likely that Mrs Hannah Newcombe named her son Samuel Prout Newcombe in honour of her brother and father.

[ABOVE] Priory House in Lower Clapton, Hackney, the site of Priory House School, a private school run by Samuel Prout Newcombe and fellow schoolmaster Howard Anderton (c1828-1901). Samuel Prout Newcombe was the proprietor of Priory House School between 1852 and 1861.
[ABOVE] A notice placed in The London Gazette on 18th January 1861, Announcing the dissolution of the business partnership between Samuel Prout Newcombe and Howard Anderton . The two schoolmasters  had been running a private school at Priory House, Lower Clapton, Hackney, London over the previous decade.
[ABOVE] An advertisement for The London School of Photography, 78 Newgate Street, London. The London School of Photography began life as a teaching institution, offering free instruction in taking portraits and landscapes. (Notes & Queries, 10th June, 1854)
[ABOVE] An advertisement for The London School of Photography, 174 Regent Street, London. The advertisement lists branch studios of The London School of Photography in London, Liverpool and Manchester. (The Athenaeum, 17th September 1859).

[ABOVE] The trade plate of The London School of Photography showing the proprietor of the company as "Mr. S. Prout Newcombe".

[ABOVE] A carte-de-visite portrait of a seated man photographed at one of the London School of Photography studios owned by Samuel Prout Newcombe (c1870). Five branch studios of The London School of Photography were detailed on the reverse of this carte-de-visite. Negative No. 83,193.
 

Robbery at The London School of Photography (1862)

[ABOVE] A report in The Photographic News, dated 2nd January 1863, detailing a robbery which took place in 1862 at the London School of Photography premises at 108 Newgate Street, London. The owner of The London School of Photography is given as Samuel Prout Newcombe, but the article makes it clear that the photographic studio was actually managed by William Joseph Anderton.
 

Samuel Prout Newcombe - Author of Educational Books for the Young

[ABOVE] The title page of "Old Eighteen-Fifty-Two; A Tale for Any Day in 1853by Samuel Prout Newcombe. When Samuel Prout Newcombe wrote this book he was running a school in Hackney, London. Trained as a schoolmaster, Samuel Prout Newcombe specialized in publications which aimed to educate and instruct children and young people. Newcombe's stated intention was to "not only to convey in an amusing manner a mass of information, but to cultivate in the reader the powers of observation, comparison, induction, and memory, by the exercise of which the mind is trained to investigate and acquire knowledge for itself". Previous titles in this series included "Fireside Facts from the Great Exhibition "(1851), and "Little Henry's Holiday at the Great Exhibition "(1851). [ABOVE] An advertisement for two books authored by Samuel Prout Newcombe in the early 1850s. The two titles advertised by the publishers Houlston and Stoneman, "The Family Sunday-Book and "Little Henry's Sunday-Book" were written by Samuel Prout Newcombe to provide religious instruction and  "bible lessons for little children". An artist and photographer, S. P. Newcombe also produced a publication entitled "Bible  Pictures for the Young". From July 1850, Samuel Prout Newcombe edited a children's magazine entitled "Pleasant Pages", described as "a journal of home education based on the infant-school system". Samuel Prout Newcombe's various articles were collected together and published in 1853 as "Pleasant Pages For Young People: Or Book Of Home Education And Entertainment "(1853).
 

Samuel Prout Newcombe and the Production of Carte-de-visite portraits at The London School of Photography

[ABOVE] A carte-de-visite portrait of a bearded man photographed at one of the London School of Photography studios owned by Samuel Prout Newcombe. On the reverse of the carte-de-visite there are details of eight  branch studios of The London School of Photography; seven in London and one in Liverpool. This cdv portrait which dates from around 1865 carries the negative number 66,452 and was taken at The London School of Photography studio at 103 Newgate Street, London.

[ABOVE] The trade plate of The London School of Photography listing six studios in London, plus one branch studio at 46 Church Street,  Liverpool. This trade plate design appears to have been used exclusively by the Liverpool branch of The London School of Photography. In 1865, Samuel Prout Newcombe disposed of the branch studios in Liverpool and Manchester to concentrate on the studios located in the capital.

[ABOVE] The trade plate of The London School of Photography as it appeared around 1874, when under the ownership of London photographer William Smorthwaite (1823-1893). In 1875, the former studio of The London School of Photography at 103 Newgate Street was sold to William Stephen Bradshaw and Thomas Godart.

By 1860, Samuel Prout Newcombe had sole control of The London School of Photography. Luckily for Newcombe, his acquisition of eight photographic portrait studios coincided with the craze for carte-de-visite portraits.

The Carte-de-visite Portrait

Cartes-de-visite were small photographic paper prints on card mounts the same size as conventional visiting cards (roughly 21/2 inches by 41/4 inches or 6.3 cm by 10.5 cm). This small format for photographic portraiture had originated in France. In the early 1850s, a number of French photographers had put forward the idea of mounting a small photographic portrait on a card the same size as the customary calling card. In 1854, a Parisian photographer named Andre Adolphe Disderi (1819-1889) devised a multi-lens camera specifically designed to produce carte-de-visite portraits. A collodion-coated glass plate could be moved inside the camera to capture between four and twelve small portraits on a single negative. This meant that a photographer equipped with a camera with four lenses could take 8 or 12 portraits, in a variety of poses, all on one camera plate. From the resulting negative, the photographer could produce a set of contact prints on albumenized paper, which could then be cut up and pasted on to small cards. The card mounts were the same size as conventional visiting cards (roughly 21/2 inches by 41/4 inches or 6.3 cm by 10.5 cm) and so this new format of photograph came to be known as  'carte de visite' - the French term for visiting card.

In 1857, Marion and Co, a French firm of photographic dealers and publishers, introduced the carte-de-visite (cdv) format to England. By 1859, the carte-de-visite portrait was fashionable in Paris, but the new format was not immediately popular in this country. It was only after the London photographer John Jabez Edwin Mayall issued a set of carte-de-visite portraits featuring Queen Victoria, Prince Albert and other members of the British Royal Family in 1860, that the demand for cdv portraits rocketed. Advertisements published in The Athenaeum show that The London School of Photography charged 10 shillings for a dozen carte-de-visite portraits in 1860.

[ABOVE] An uncut contact sheet of 8 carte-de-visite portraits by Andre Adolphe Disderi (1819-1889), the Parisian photographer who devised the multi-lens carte-de-visite camera. The above photograph, dating from around 1862, features eight photographic portraits of a young woman in a variety of poses

The End of The London School of Photography

By 1862, at the height of  "cartomania", Samuel Prout Newcombe owned a chain of nine photographic portrait studios, one in Liverpool, another in Manchester and seven in London. By the end of the decade, Samuel Prout Newcombe had made his fortune. In 1870, Samuel Prout Newcombe decided to retire from the photography business and sold the remaining five London studios of The London School of Photography to William Smorthwaite (1822-1893). Faced with the declining popularity of the carte-de-visite portrait during the 1870s, Smorthwaite gradually broke up The London School of Photography chain of studios by selling off each of the individual studios to other London photographers. The firm of Bradshaw & Godart (a partnership between London photographers William Stephen Bradshaw and Thomas Godart) purchased the studio at 103 Newgate, City of London, from William Smorthwaite around 1875. The Myddleton Hall studio at 142 Upper Street, Islington, North London, was sold to Edward Adams in 1876.

William Smorthwaite retained the studio at 52 Cheapside in the City of London for his own use, but passed the Regent Street studio to his daughter-in-law Mrs Emma Smorthwaite, the widow of William Joseph Smorthwaite (William Smorthwaite senior's eldest son). Mrs Emma Smorthwaite, who was born "Emma Read" in St Albans in 1844, had married William Joseph Smorthwaite (born 1849, Romford, Essex) around the time he emigrated to Canada to work as a photographer in Ontario. Mrs Emma Smorthwaite (born1844, St Albans, Hertfordshire), who had returned to England after her photographer husband had died in Canada, operated the Regent Street studio under the name of Smorthwaite even after she married Charles Alfred Bungey (born 1851, London) in 1876.

 

To view a selection of carte-de-visite portraits produced at Samuel Prout Newcombe's London School of Photography studios, click on the link below:

The London School of Photography (Samuel Prout Newcombe) -  Photographic Gallery

 
The London School of Photography
[ABOVE] An advertisement for The London School of Photography, 78 Newgate Street, London. The London School of Photography began life as a teaching institution, offering free instruction in taking portraits and landscapes. (Notes & Queries, 10th June, 1854)
[ABOVE] An advertisement for The London School of Photography, 174 Regent Street, London. The advertisement lists branch studios of The London School of Photography in London, Liverpool and Manchester. (The Athenaeum, 17th September 1859).

[ABOVE] The trade plate of The London School of Photography - Proprietor: Mr. S. Prout Newcombe, from the reverse of a carte-de-visite portrait (c1865). At this stage, Samuel Prout Newcombe owned 7 studios in London and one branch at 46 Church Street, Liverpool. The London School of Photography began life in 1854 as a teaching institution, offering free instruction in photography. Within a few years, The London School of Photography were running photographic portrait studios on a commercial basis.

[ABOVE] The trade plate of The London School of Photography - Proprietor: Mr. S. Prout Newcombe, from the reverse of a carte-de-visite portrait (c1868). At this stage, Samuel Prout Newcombe owned five studios in London. At the height of "cartomania", when thousands of cartes-de-visite were being produced each week, Samuel Prout Newcombe owned 8 photographic studios in London, plus two branch studios in Lancashire, one in Liverpool, the other in Manchester.

[ABOVE] A carte-de-visite portrait of a man seated at a table, photographed at one of the London School of Photography studios owned by Samuel Prout Newcombe. On the reverse of the carte-de-visite there are details of seven branch studios of The London School of Photography; six in London and one in Liverpool. Negative No. 52,287. [ABOVE] A carte-de-visite portrait of a young man perched on the edge of a table, photographed at one of the London School of Photography studios owned by Samuel Prout Newcombe. On the reverse of the carte-de-visite there are details of eight branch studios of The London School of Photography; seven in London and one in Liverpool. Negative No. 71,412. [ABOVE] A carte-de-visite portrait of a woman seated at a table, photographed at Samuel Prout's studio at 52 Cheapside, London (c1868). On the reverse of the carte-de-visite there are details of the five London studios of The London School of Photography. Prout's studios in Liverpool and Manchester were sold in 1865, a few years before this portrait was taken. Negative No. 48,918.

Studios of The London School of Photography

STUDIO ADDRESS

DATES ACTIVE

NOTES

78 Newgate Street, City of London

1854 - 1859

MANAGER: Charles William Quinn

44 Regent Street Circus, Westminster, London

1856 - 1857

 
174 Regent Street, Westminster, London

1857 - 1875

Acquired by Mrs Emma Smorthwaite (Mrs E. Bungey) in 1875
Myddleton Hall, 142 Upper St., Islington, London

1857 - 1875

Acquired by Edward Adams in 1875
Pantheon, Oxford Street, Westminster, London

1859 - 1867

Acquired by wine merchants W. & A. Gilbey in 1867
23 Poultry, City of London

1859 - 1866

Acquired by Photographic Cameo Portrait Company in 1866
52 Cheapside, City of London

1860 - 1876

Purchased by William Smorthwaite in 1876
103 Newgate Street, City of London

1860 - 1875

Purchased by Wm. S. Bradshaw & Thos. P. Godart in 1876
52 King William Street, City of London

1862 - 1863

Purchased by Windsor & Carter
Soho Bazaar, Oxford St., Westminster, London

1867 - 1873

 

1 Market Place, Manchester, Lancashire

1857 - 1865

Purchased from Maria Clarke in 1857 by S. Prout Newcombe
46 Church Street, Liverpool, Lancashire

1859 - 1865

 
Around 1870, Samuel Prout Newcombe, the proprietor of The London School of Photography, disposed of his London photographic studios to William Smorthwaite (1823-1893). By the mid 1870s William Smorthwaite had sold individual studios to other London photographers such as William Stephen Bradshaw (1833-1915), who acquired the Newgate Street studio.

[ABOVE] The trade plate of photographer William Stephen Bradshaw in 1880. William Stephen Bradshaw was keen to mention The London School of Photography in his publicity. [ABOVE] The trade plate of the firm of W. S. Bradshaw & Sons of 103 Newgate Street, London as used in 1890. William Stephen Bradshaw still makes reference to The London School of Photography.
[ABOVE] The trade plate of The London School of Photography listing seven studios in London, plus one branch studio at 46 Church Street,  Liverpool. Around 1870, Samuel Prout Newcombe, the proprietor of The London School of Photography, sold off his photography business to the London photographer William Smorthwaite (1823-1893).

[ABOVE] The trade plate of The London School of Photography as it appeared in 1875, when under the ownership of London photographer William Smorthwaite (1823-1893). In 1875,William Smorthwaite passed the London School of Photography studio at 174 Regent Street to his daughter-in-law Mrs Emma Smorthwaite (born 1844, St Albans, Hertfordshire).

 
The Family of Samuel Prout Newcombe
Samuel Prout Newcombe was married twice. On 28th June 1849, Samuel Prout Newcombe married Mary Harriet White in Islington, North London. [The marriage of Samuel Prout Newcombe and Mary Harriet White was registered in Islington during the 2nd Quarter of 1849]. Mrs Mary Harriet Newcombe gave birth to two children before her early death in 1853. Mary and Samuel Prout Newcombe's first child was a boy named Frederick Samuel Newcombe who was born in Hackney during the 2nd Quarter of 1850. A second child, a daughter christened Mary White Newcombe arrived the following year. [The birth of Mary White Newcombe was registered in Hackney during the 3rd Quarter of 1851]. Mrs Mary Harriet Newcombe died at the family home in Clapton early in 1853.

Samuel Prout Newcombe took a second wife when he wed Hannah Hales Anderton (born c1834, London) in 1854. Samuel Newcombe's bride was the sister of Howard Anderton, Samuel's fellow teacher and business partner. [The marriage of Samuel Prout Newcombe and Hannah Hales Anderton was registered in the London district of Islington during the 4th Quarter of 1854]. Five children resulted from this second union - Ada Mary Newcombe (born 1855, Clapton, London), Bertha Newcombe (born 1857, Clapton, London), Claude Newcombe (born 1859, Clapton, London), Mabel Newcombe (born 1862, Reigate, Surrey) and Jessie Winifred Newcombe (born 1864, Reigate, Surrey).

By 1861,Samuel Prout Newcombe had moved out of central London and settled in Reigate, Surrey. From the income generated by his photography business, Samuel Prout Newcombe began to invest in property and housing development. A document dated 28th December 1865 lists Samuel Prout Newcombe as one of 17 investors in a property development scheme to build houses on the Farncombe Place estate near the West Sussex seaside town of Worthing.

The 1871 census records Samuel and Hannah Newcombe and their seven children living in Reigate, Surrey. In 1870, Samuel Prout Newcombe had sold The School of Photography to William Smorthwaite (born c1823, St Albans, Hertfordshire) and from this date he obtained his living from various investments.

By 1878, Samuel Prout Newcombe and his family had moved to "Northcote", Park Hill Road, Croydon, Surrey. The Newcombe family retained its connections with the Sussex seaside resort of Hastings. The 1881 census records Samuel and Hannah Newcombe and their two youngest daughters, eighteen year old Mabel and sixteen year old Jessie boarding at Mrs Ann Phillips' lodging house at No.1 Exmouth Place, Hastings. By this date, Samuel Prout Newcombe was no longer involved with the London School of Photography and was earning a living from "Mortgages and Dividends".

Living in semi-retirement with his family in Surrey, Samuel Prout Newcombe involved himself in charitable works and social reform and pursued his interest in art and natural history. Samuel Prout Newcombe  who had connections with the eminent topographical artist Samuel Prout (1783-1852) and the artist John Skinner Prout (1805-1876), also took up landscape painting in watercolour. Samuel Prout Newcombe is listed in The Dictionary of British Watercolour Artists by Huon L. Mallalieu (1986, 2003) and occasionally Samuel Prout Newcombe's landscapes come up for auction. A chalk drawing by Samuel Prout Newcombe, entitled "Grasmere, Westmoreland" and inscribed "25 Aug. '79", was recently sold by Bonhams Fine Art Auctioneers, together with "other drawings by the same hand".

Mrs Hannah Hales Newcombe (c1834-1905), the wife of Samuel Prout Newcombe, was active in the Women's Suffrage Movement. Mrs Hannah Prout Newcombe was a committee member of the Croydon branch of the National Society of Women's Suffrage and in 1873 "Mrs Prout Newcombe" was recorded as the Society's treasurer. Samuel Prout Newcombe evidently shared his wife's beliefs as he was also listed as a committee member of the Croydon branch of the National Society of Women's Suffrage in a document dated 25th April 1873.

Bertha Newcombe, one of Samuel Prout Newcombe's daughters, combined her father's interest in Fine Art with her mother's dedication to the cause of women's suffrage and equality. Bertha became a professional artist, offering her artistic talents to the cause of female equality. [See the section below entitled "Bertha Newcombe - Artist and Campaigner for Women's Suffrage"]. Frederick Samuel Newcombe, Samuel Prout Newcombe's eldest son from his first marriage, became a Professor of Music.

In 1891, Samuel Prout Newcombe was living at Noble's Green, Lingfield, Surrey, but by 1894 he also had a town residence at No.1 Cheyne Walk, Chelsea, S. W. London. Keenly interested in natural history, Samuel Prout Newcombe had amassed a large collection of specimens and books on natural history. In May 1894, Samuel Prout Newcombe agreed to house his natural history book collection at the Buckingham Palace Road Library so it could be accessed by the reading public. "Nature", the International Journal of Science, reported in 1899 that: "Mr. S. Prout Newcombe has offered the London County Council his educational collection of natural history specimens and literature. This collection, which consists of about 21,000 objects, included a considerable number of works on natural history subjects". Another report noted that Samuel Prout Newcombe's collection of natural history objects consisted of minerals, corals, birds, reptiles and fishes. Samuel Prout Newcombe had bequeathed his natural history collection, which was valued at £3000 (pounds), as a gift to the London County Council. Official documents dating from around 1901, also refer to Samuel Prout Newcombe's Charity whereby scholarships and prizes, administered by School Board for London, were presented to deserving scholars.

The 1901 census records Samuel Prout Newcombe and his wife Mrs Hannah Newcombe at No.1 Cheyne Walk, Chelsea, S.W. London. Sharing Samuel Newcombe's Chelsea home were his three youngest daughters, all unmarried ladies of a certain age - Bertha Newcombe, aged 44, Mabel Newcombe, aged 38, and thirty-six year old Jessie Winifred Newcombe. The Head of the Household, seventy-seven year old S. P. Newcombe is described as living on his "Own Means".

Mrs Hannah Hales Newcombe died in Chelsea in 1905 at the age of 71. Although she died at her London home Samuel Prout Newcombe's wife was buried in the churchyard at Lingfield, Surrey. Mrs Newcombe's gravestone can still be seen in the Parish Church of St Peter & St Paul in Lingfield, Surrey.

Samuel Prout Newcombe died at his home in Chelsea in 1912 at the age of 88. [The death of Samuel Prout Newcombe was registered in the London district of Chelsea during the 4th Quarter of 1912].

[ABOVE] A carte-de-visite portrait of an unknown woman  photographed at one of the London School of Photography studios owned by Samuel Prout Newcombe (c1865). On the reverse of the carte-de-visite there are details of seven branch studios of The London School of Photography; six in London and one in Liverpool. (Negative No. 51,009). In 1870, Samuel Prout Newcombe sold The School of Photography to William Smorthwaite (born c1823, St Albans, Hertfordshire).

[ABOVE] A 19th century photograph of Cheyne Walk, Chelsea. Samuel Prout Newcombe and his family lived at No. 1 Cheyne Walk. Although many of the houses in this fashionable street were built in Georgian times, No. 1 Cheyne Walk was a relatively modern house, having been built between 1887 and 1888 on the site of an early 18th century house.

[ABOVE] A poster advocating "Votes for Women"

 

Bertha Newcombe (1857-1947) - Artist and Campaigner for Women's Suffrage

[ABOVE] A life drawing class at the Slade School of Fine Art , University College, Gower Street, London (c1880). The Slade was the first English art school to offer female students the opportunity to make drawings from living models rather than antique statues. Bertha Newcombe, who attended The Slade in 1876, is believed to have been one of the first women artists to train at this progressive art school.
 

[ABOVE] "A Downton Lace Maker", a signed painting by Bertha Newcombe. Throughout her life, Bertha Newcombe had sympathy for the plight of elderly women. In her will, Bertha Newcombe made a bequest of a large sum of money to be "devoted to the housing in flats or rooms of elderly women of limited means" and for the restoration of almshouses which catered for old women.
 
[ABOVE] "An Incident in Connection with the Presentation of the First Women’s Suffrage Petition to Parliament in 1866", an oil painting by Bertha Newcombe (1910). This picture by Bertha Newcombe shows Emily Davies and Elizabeth Garrett Anderson showing John Stuart Mill, MP for Westminster, the petition for women's suffrage which they had hidden away under the stall of an apple-seller in Westminster Hall. After accepting the petition, John Stuart Mill, MP, agreed to campaign for women's suffrage in the House of Commons.
 

[ABOVE] A Women's Suffrage poster created by Bertha Newcombe on behalf of the Artists Suffrage League (1910). This poster aimed to encourage contributions to the "Election Fund" which would support "Women's Suffrage Candidates" in the 1910 General election.
 

[ABOVE] "Problems of Trade Unionism - Mr and Mrs Sidney Webb" (1894), a drawing  by Bertha Newcombe showing Beatrice Webb and her husband Sidney Webb working together on their economic and social theories. This illustration is signed "BERTHA NEWCOMBE" in the bottom right-hand corner.
 

[ABOVE] The Bugler Girl, a poster designed by Caroline Marsh Watts (born 1868, Hansworth, Staffs.) for the Artists Suffrage League (1908). The Bugler Girl design also formed the central image in the badge of the National Union of Women's Suffrage Societies (Suffragists)
 

[ABOVE] Votes for Workers, a poster designed by W. F. Winter for the Artists Suffrage League (c1910).
 

 [ABOVE] A design for a Christmas card produced by the Artists Suffrage League (c1910). Santa Claus, who carries a sack of parliamentary votes, suggests the vote should be given to females by asking the question "Shan't we give the Girls some this time?"
 

[ABOVE] The suffragette artist Sylvia Pankhurst (1882-1960) photographed in her studio (c1910). Sylvia Pankhurst was a member of the Women's Social and Political Union, a militant feminist organisation criticised by Bertha Newcombe

[ABOVE] A portrait of the playwright and political activist George Bernard Shaw (1856-1950), photographed by Frederick H. Evans in 1896, around the time he was involved in a relationship with Bertha Newcombe. A fellow member of the Fabian Society, Bertha Newcombe fell in love with George Bernard Shaw when he made regular visits to her Chelsea studio in 1892. George Bernard Shaw had agreed to pose for a painted portrait and during the long sittings at her Cheyne Walk studio, the thirty-five year old artist became fascinated by the Irish-born writer. Bertha had hoped that her strong feelings for Shaw were reciprocated and even thought he might ask her to marry him. Bertha Newcombe's three-quarter-length portrait of George Bernard Shaw, entitled "GBS - Platform Spellbinder" was painted during the February and March of 1892. The finished portrait apparently showed Shaw delivering a political speech. George Bernard Shaw later wrote that Bertha Newcombe's "portrait of me on the platform is still the best vision of me at that period". Although he admired her artistic skill, Shaw had no intention of marrying Bertha. When he made the acquaintance of Charlotte Payne Townsend (who he was later to marry), Shaw took the opportunity to detach himself from his "emotional entanglement " with Bertha.  Although Bertha felt bitter about her treatment by Shaw, she was still in regular contact with the playwright some 25 years later.
 
GEORGE BERNARD SHAW ON HIS 'AFFAIR' WITH BERTHA NEWCOMBE

George Bernard Shaw pictured by the firm of  Elliot & Fry in 1891.

"Everybody seems bent on recommending me to marry Bertha - a fact fatal to her hopes (if it is fair to accuse her of hopes). The feeling, as I understand it, is that there is a fearful danger of my marrying somebody, and that it is perhaps more prudent to pair me with Bertha than to run the risk of my being borne off by someone worse. Now my own view is that since she is neither strong enough nor disorderly enough for a lawless life, nor cold & self sufficient enough to enjoy a genuinely single one, she ought to marry someone else. She is only wasting her affections on me. I give her nothing ; and I do not even take everything - in fact I don't take anything, which makes her most miserable. She has no idea with regard to me except that she would like to tie me like a pet dog to her easel & have me always make love to her when she is tired of painting. And she might just as well feel that way to Cleopatra's needle." 

George Bernard Shaw in a letter dated 24th August 1895.

BERTHA NEWCOMBE ON HER AFFAIR WITH GEORGE BERNARD SHAW

"Shaw was, I should imagine, by preference a passionless man. He had passed through experiences and he seemed to have no wish for and even to fear passion though he admitted its power and pleasure. The sight of a woman deeply in love with him annoyed him. He was not in love with me, in the usual sense, or at any rate as he said only for a very short time, and he found I think those times the pleasantest when I was the appreciative listener. Unfortunately on my side there was a deep feeling most injudiciously displayed & from this distance I realise how exasperating it must have been to him. He had decided I think on a line of honourable conduct - honourable to his thinking. He kept strictly to the letter of it while allowing himself every opportunity of transgressing the spirit. Frequent talking, talking, talking of the pros & cons of marriage, even to my prospects of money or the want of it, his dislike of the sexual relation & so on, would create an atmosphere of love-making without any need for caresses or endearments.

Lovemaking would have been very delightful, doubtless, but I wanted, besides, a wider companionship and as I was inadequately equipped for that, except as a painter of some intelligence, he refused to give more than amusement."

Bertha Newcombe in a note to Ashley Dukes (1928)

"Shaw has not a gift of sympathetic penetration into a woman's nature. He employs his clever detective power and pounces on weaknesses & faults which confirm his pre-conceived ideas. He imagines he understands."

Bertha Newcombe (1928)

[RIGHT] George Bernard Shaw portrayed in a sketch by the American portrait painter Alice Pike Barney (1857-1931)

 

Book Illustrations Drawn by Bertha Newcombe

TITLE

AUTHOR

DATE

Richard Jefferies: A Study Henry Stephens Salt

1894

Maureen's Fairing Jane Barlow (1857-1917)

1895

Mrs. Martin's Company Jane Barlow

1896

The Charmer: A Seaside Comedy Shan F. Bullock 1897
My Lady Frivol Rosa Nouchette Carey 1900
The Mill on the Floss (originally published in 1860 ) George Eliot (pseudonym of Mary Anne Evans/ Lewes)

1900

Cranford (originally published in 1851 ) Mrs Elizabeth Gaskell 1900
Love in our Village Orme Agnus*

1901

Jan Oxber Orme Agnus* 1902
Sarah Tuldon - A Woman Who Had Her Way Orme Agnus* 1903
  *Orme Agnus was the pseudonym of John C. Higginbotham (1866-1919)  
Lost Gip (originally published in 1873) Hesba Stretton*  
  * Hesba Stretton was the pseudonym of Sarah Smith (1832-1911)  
Esau & St. Issey Joseph Hocking 1904
The Master of Marshlands Evelyn Everett Green 1906
Hope My Wife Lucy Gertrude Moberly

1906

Dan and Another Lucy Gertrude Moberly

1907

 

[ABOVE] "The Parish Clerk, Old Times" (1897), an illustration drawn by Bertha Newcombe. Between 1895 and 1897, Bertha Newcombe made drawings depicting church and village life for The English Illustrated Magazine.

Bertha Newcombe was born at Priory House, Lower Clapton, London in 1857, one of five daughters born to Hannah Hales Anderton and Samuel Prout Newcombe, a schoolmaster who ran a school at Priory House and owned a chain of photographic portrait studios trading under the name of The London School of Photography. [ See the section above, headed Samuel Prout Newcombe (c1824-1912) ]

For most of her life, Bertha Newcombe lived at the home of her parents. A few years after her birth in Lower Clapton, Bertha moved with her family to Reigate in Surrey. By the early 1870s, Samuel Prout Newcombe had set up home at 'Northcote', Park Hill Road, Croydon, Surrey. It was during this time that Samuel Prout Newcombe and his wife became active in the Croydon branch of the National Society for Women's Suffrage. It appears that in 1876 Bertha Newcombe left Croydon to study art at The Slade School of Fine Art in London. When the 1881 census was taken, Bertha Newcombe was living at the home of Nathan Bowes, a London wool merchant, at 17 Windsor Road, Camberwell, South London. On the census return, Bertha is described as a twenty-four year old "Artist". After she completed her training as a professional artist, Bertha joined her parents at their home in Noble's Green, Lingfield, Surrey. From around 1894, the Newcombe's main residence was at No.1 Cheyne Walk, Chelsea, S. W. London. The 1901 census records Samuel Prout Newcombe, his wife Hannah and their three unmarried daughters at No.1 Cheyne Walk, Chelsea. Sharing Samuel Newcombe's Chelsea home were forty-four year old Bertha Newcombe and her two younger sisters Mabel Newcombe, aged 38, and thirty-six year old Jessie Winifred Newcombe. The Head of the Household at No.1 Cheyne Walk was Bertha's seventy-seven year old father Samuel P. Newcombe, described as living on his "Own Means". Bertha Newcombe worked from "a small wainscoted studio" at her father's house in Chelsea until Samuel Prout Newcombe's death in 1912. Bertha Newcombe spent the last years of her life at Red Lynch, Tilmore, Petersfield, Hampshire.

Bertha Newcombe - Professional Artist

Samuel Prout Newcombe, Bertha's father, was an amateur artist and a number of the men from her grandmother's side of the family, the Prouts, had been eminent artists in the 19th century e.g. the watercolour artist Samuel Prout (1783-1852), the topographical painter and lithographer John Skinner Prout (1805-1876).

[ABOVE] A drawing class at the Slade School of Fine Art , University College, Gower Street, London (1881).  In this illustration from the Illustrated London News, the female students are shown drawing from plaster casts of antique classical statues. In fact, The Slade was the first English art school to offer female students the opportunity to study from living models rather than antique statues. Bertha Newcombe, who attended The Slade in 1876, is believed to have been one of the first women artists to train at this progressive art school. The inset picture on this illustration shows The Slade School of Fine Art in the North Wing of  London's University College.

Bertha Newcombe, who showed talent as as artist from a young age, attended The Slade School of Fine Art in 1876. Bertha is believed to have been one of the first women artists to train at The Slade. By 1882, she was exhibiting her paintings alongside other promising artists such as Edward Stott (1859-1918) and the London-based American artist John Singer Sargent (1856-1925). A critical notice in The Fortnightly Review of an 1882 art exhibition singled out Edward Stott and Bertha Newcombe for praise: "Mr. Stott, whose landscapes this year are masterpieces, and who seems certain of a medal, is English by birth, and so is Miss Bertha Newcombe, whose pictures owe something to Jules Breton, but are painted with great force and breadth". In addition to Jules Breton (1827-1906), the French realist painter, Bertha Newcombe was also influenced by Stanhope Forbes (1857-1947) and the Newlyn School of painters. A review published in 1889 in The Magazine of Art was impressed by Bertha Newcombe's artistic ability, but had reservations about her painting style: "This artist's 'In the Orchard' is a genuinely sincere out-of-doors sketch, and is full of atmosphere and sunlight. So good is it, that we cannot help feeling a little regret that it is somewhat mannered, and painted too much under the influence of the Newlyn School". The Magazine of Art had championed Bertha Newcombe from the very start of her career as a professional artist. In 1881, a reviewer had written: "From the hand of Miss Bertha Newcombe were 'Three Studies of Mere Morot'  very intelligent impressionary (sic) drawings of an old peasant at work in her cottage".  An art critic writing in another journal about the same 1881 exhibition also directed special attention to Bertha's sketches of the old peasant woman, writing: "We may especially draw attention to 'Three Studies of Mere Morot', vigorous in light and shade, by Bertha Newcombe, an artist of power in the portraiture of character".

In 1888, Bertha Newcombe became a member of the New English Art Club. A group of young English artists had founded the New English Art Club in 1885 in reaction to the conservative attitudes of the Royal Academy and had mounted its first alternative exhibition of Impressionist influenced works in April 1886. By the time Bertha Newcombe joined the New English Art Club in 1888, a number of the original founder members were no longer associated with the NEAC, but she did exhibit her work alongside artists such as Philip Wilson Steer (1860-1942) and Walter Richard Sickert (1860-1942). Bertha Newcombe was also friendly with the expatriate American painter James McNeill Whistler (1834-1903), with whom she corresponded. After the death of James McNeill Whistler in 1903, Bertha Newcombe was appointed Honorary Secretary of the Whistler Memorial Fund.

Although associated with the New English Art Club, Bertha Newcombe did exhibit her work at the more conservative Royal Academy. Over the years, Bertha Newcombe exhibited eleven works at the Royal Academy with titles such as  'A Cowslip Field' and 'Fragrant Posies'. Primarily a painter of landscape and figurative subjects, Miss Newcombe occasionally turned to portraiture [ Bertha Newcombe made several portrait studies of George Bernard Shaw and produced likenesses of the English novelist Coulson Kernahan (1858-1943) and fellow members of the socialist Fabian Society, including Sidney Webb (1859-1947) and Mrs Beatrice Webb (1858-1943)]. Between 1876 and 1904, Bertha Newcombe exhibited her work at The New English Art Club, The Royal Academy, The Royal Institute of Oil Painters, The Royal Institute of Painters in Water Colours, The Fine Art Society, The Dudley Gallery, The London Salon and The Society of British Artists. Reviews of her exhibited artwork mention paintings entitled 'A Meadow of Flowers' (1884), 'An April Moon' (1905, Royal Academy) and 'A Primrose Copse' (1904), described as "an exquisite landscape".

A staunch feminist, Bertha Newcombe was a member of The Society of Women Artists, The Society of Lady Artists and The Artists Suffrage League (a group of women artists who produced artwork for the political cause of "Votes for Women")

Politics and Art

Both of Bertha Newcombe's parents were supporters of "Votes for Women". As early as 1872, Samuel Prout Newcombe and his wife Hannah had subscribed to the Central Committee of the National Society for Women's Suffrage. When the first meeting of the Croydon branch of the National Society for Women's Suffrage was held on 25th April 1873, Mr Samuel Prout Newcombe was a member of the ruling Committee and his wife Mrs Hannah Prout Newcombe served as the Society's treasurer. In 1896, Mr and Mrs Prout Newcombe were making financial contributions to the Women's Emancipation Union.

It is thought that Bertha Newcombe became more actively involved in the campaign for women's suffrage after she attended a conference of the Women's Franchise League in London on 25th July 1889. By the early 1890s, Bertha Newcombe had become a keen member of the Fabian Society, a socialist organisation set up oppose the inequalities of capitalism and reconstruct society "in accordance with the highest moral possibilities." It was during her association with the Fabian Society that Bertha Newcombe made the acquaintance of Mrs Beatrice Webb (1858-1943), Beatrice's husband Sidney Webb (1859-1947), Graham Wallas (1858-1932), a social psychologist and lecturer and the famous playwright and author George Bernard Shaw (1856-1950).

[ABOVE] A portrait of Mrs Beatrice Webb (1858-1943) by Bertha Newcombe. This drawing is credited to Bertha Newcombe, but appears to have been based on a photograph taken at the London studio of Elliott & Fry in the early 1890s. Bertha Newcombe became friendly with Mrs Beatrice Webb and her husband Sidney Webb (1859-1947) when she joined the Fabian Society, an organisation which aimed to transform society through socialist ideas.

Around 1907, Bertha Newcombe joined The Artists Suffrage League, a group of women artists who supported the political objective of "Votes for Women". The Artists Suffrage League had been set up in January 1907 by Mary Lowndes (1856-1929), a stained-glass artist and designer of posters. The aim of The Artists Suffrage League was "to further the cause of Women's Enfranchisement by the work and professional help of artists ... by bringing in an attractive manner before the public eye the long-continued demand for the vote." Members of the The Artists Suffrage League included women artists such as May H. Barker, Clara Billing, Barbara Forbes, Mary Sargeant Florence, Emily Ford, Violet Garrard, Emily J. Harding, Caroline Watts and the Australian artist Mrs Dora Meeson Coates, who was married to the portrait painter George Coates. The professional artists of The Artists Suffrage League designed posters and Christmas cards, drew political cartoons, provided illustrations for leaflets and programmes, designed banners for marches and demonstrations and decorated meeting halls, all in the service of the campaign for Women's Suffrage.

[ABOVE] C. Hedley Charlton's front cover design for  "Beware! A Warning to Suffragists" a satirical pamphlet written by the feminist writer Cicely Hamilton (1872-1952)  for the Artists Suffrage League (c1910).  [ABOVE] A design for a Christmas card drawn by C. Hedley Charlton, one of the artists working for the Artists Suffrage League (c1910).
[ABOVE] A photograph by Mrs Christina Broom (1862-1939) showing Suffragists at a demonstration organised by the National Union of Women's Suffrage Societies carrying banners designed by the Artists Suffrage League (13th June 1908). The "Joan of Arc" banner in the centre was designed by Barbara Forbes and the "Jenny Lind" banner on the right was created by Mary Lowndes (1856-1929).

Suffragists (N. U. W. S. S.) and Suffragettes (W. S. P. U.)

[ABOVE] Badge produced in 1908 for the National Union of Women's Suffrage Societies or the N. U. W. S. S.  (Suffragists)

[ABOVE] "Votes for Women" badge (1908) produced for the W. S. P. U.  (Suffragettes). The Suffragettes adopted purple, white and green as their official colours.

[ABOVE] "Votes for Women Wanted Everywhere", a front cover design for the Votes for Women journal, the periodical of the Women's Social and Political Union or W. S. P. U. (Suffragettes). In 1903, the militant wing of the National Union of Women's Suffrage Societies ( N. U. W. S. S. ) had broken away to form  the Women's Social and Political Union or W. S. P. U. (commonly known as "Suffragettes")

Although Bertha Newcombe was a socialist and an advocate of women's rights she was associated with the moderate, non-militant wing of the Women's Suffrage movement, pursuing "votes for women" through peaceful, non-violent, constitutional means. In 1913, Bertha Newcombe was a member of the executive committee of the London Society for Women's Suffrage, which was critical of the aggressive methods of the Women's Social and Political Union or W. S. P. U., commonly known as "Suffragettes".

Bertha Newcombe and George Bernard Shaw

Through the Fabian Society, Bertha Newcombe had made the acquaintance of the famous Irish-born playwright and author George Bernard Shaw (1856-1950). Bertha persuaded Shaw to pose for a portrait at her studio in Cheyne Walk, Chelsea. During the portrait sittings, which took place in the months of February and March 1892, Bertha Newcombe , thirty-five years old and single, became increasingly captivated by the charming playwright. Shaw had a reputation for being flirtatious and during this period he had been romantically linked with a succession of young and not so young women (Janet Achurch, Florence Farr, Alice Lockett, May Morris, Alma Murray, Edith Nesbit, Jenny Patterson, Ellen Terry and Molly Tompkins). As one of George Bernard Shaw's biographers commented, the philandering playwright "was careful not to confound the erotic or romantic impulse with long-term companionship"

During the long portrait sittings Bertha Newcombe had long conversations with George Bernard Shaw, with whom she shared similar ideas about women's rights, art and politics (they were both socialists and members of The Fabian Society). Bertha Newcombe became fascinated with Shaw and began to succumb to his charm.  Before long, Bertha had fallen in love with Shaw. Because of his flirtatious manner, Bertha became convinced that Shaw was equally attracted to her. After one particularly long portrait sitting on 27th February 1892, which lasted until 9.30 pm, George Bernard Shaw dined with the love-struck artist. The friendship between the two deepened and between February 1892 and March 1897, Bertha Newcombe and George Bernard Shaw were constant companions. ( In August 1894, Bertha Newcombe accompanied George Bernard Shaw on a visit to Borough Farm, near Godalming, Surrey, and sketched him with three of her Fabian companions. In the Easter of 1895, George Bernard Shaw and a group of half a dozen Fabian socialists went for a week's holiday at the Beachy Head Hotel, near Eastbourne, Sussex. Apart from Beatrice Webb, the wife of Sidney Webb, Bertha Newcombe was the only woman in the holiday party).

Bertha Newcombe - as others have seen her (Contemporary and modern accounts)

[ABOVE] A young female art student sitting in front of her easel and holding a painter's maul-stick, pictured at a drawing class held at The Slade School of Fine Art,  London (1881).

"She (Bertha Newcombe) is petite and dark, about forty years old, but looks more like a wizened girl, than a fully developed woman. Her jet-black hair, heavily fringed, half smart, half artistic clothes, pinched aquiline features and thin lips, give you a somewhat unpleasant impression though not wholly inartistic." Beatrice Webb (Diary entry 9th March 1897)

"Some of his (George Bernard Shaw's) later affairs were protracted; he emerged battle-scarred from a five-year relationship with the beautiful red-haired and blue-eyed Fabian artist Bertha Newcombe." JOSEPH R. ORGEL in "Undying Passion" (1985)

"He (George Bernard Shaw) had been involved in two love affairs, one with the actress, Florence Farr, and the other with Bertha Newcombe, a portrait painter of uncommon talent and a vulnerability to romantic passion." JANET DUNBAR in "Mrs G. B. S. - A Portrait" (1963)

"Bertha Newcombe looked a good candidate (as a potential wife for George Bernard Shaw). That she was Fabian was essential; that she was 'lady-like' no disadvantage; and that she was 'not wholly inartistic' an unlooked-for bonus. She was in her thirties and, despite her aquiline features, thin lips and a figure that put Beatrice in mind of a wizened child, not perhaps lacking absolutely in all attraction. At least she was quite smartly turned out petite and dark, with neat, heavily fringed black hair. And she was devoted to Shaw." MICHAEL HOLROYD in his biography "George Bernard Shaw - the Search for Love" (1988)

George Bernard Shaw was pleased with Bertha Newcombe's finished painting of him, a three-quarter-length portrait of Shaw delivering a political speech, entitled "GBS - Platform Spellbinder". George Bernard Shaw admired his female friend's artistic talent and many years later recognised that Bertha Newcombe's "portrait of me on the platform is still the best vision of me at that period". ( Bertha Newcombe's 1892 portrait of George Bernard Shaw, "GBS - Platform Spellbinder" was well-received and was reproduced in several publications, but is now lost, believed to have been destroyed during a bombing raid during the Second World War).

George Bernard Shaw was very conscious of Bertha Newcombe's romantic fixation. When he published a reproduction of "GBS - Platform Spellbinder" in a collection of his speeches, Shaw rather unkindly captioned the picture "Portrait by Bertha Newcombe, Spellbound". Shaw became irritated by Bertha Newcombe's slavish attention, believing her "deep feelings" were "most injudiciously displayed". When George Bernard Shaw made the acquaintance of Charlotte Payne-Townsend (who he was later to marry), he took the opportunity to detach himself from his "emotional entanglement" with Bertha. By the beginning of March 1897, Bertha Newcombe, who had observed Shaw in the constant company of Charlotte Payne-Townsend and with whom, in Shaw's own words, he was "philandering shamelessly and outrageously", finally realised that she now had no hope of marrying the red-bearded playwright. It was left to Beatrice Webb to console the heart-broken artist, as she explained in a diary entry, dated 9th March 1897, describing a visit to Bertha Newcombe's Chelsea studio:

"I felt somewhat uncomfortable as I knew I should encounter a sad soul, full of bitterness and loneliness.

I stepped into a small wainscoted studio and was greeted coldly by the little woman.

"You are well out of it, Miss Newcombe, I said gently. If you had married Shaw he would not have remained faithful to you. You know my opinion of him - as a friend and colleague, as a critic and literary worker, there are few men for whom I have so warm a liking; but in his relations with women he is vulgar, if not worse; it is a vulgarity that includes cruelty and springs from vanity".

 Beatrice Webb (Extracts from a diary entry dated 9th March 1897)

When Bertha Newcombe heard that George Bernard Shaw was to marry Charlotte Payne-Townsend (1857-1943), a Fabian socialist from a wealthy Irish family, the news "provoked the jealous Bertha into an outburst against him for stooping to marry money". When Bertha Newcombe later wrote about her "love affair" with George Bernard Shaw she described him as "a passionless man" and observed that "the sight of a woman deeply in love with him annoyed him." Miss Newcombe went on to write

Despite the acrimonious break-up of their romantic attachment, Bertha Newcombe continued to see  George Bernard Shaw as a friend and colleague. In 1909, Bertha approached the famous playwright about the possibility of acquiring the performance rights of his women's suffrage play 'Press Cuttings'. In 1918, Shaw noticed that Bertha Newcombe, some twenty years after their "love affair" had ended, was determined to "preserve her grievance". Although he had regular meetings with the artist, Shaw was still complaining in 1919, that Miss Newcombe "has the most maddening way of giving me impossible invitations at the wrong moment, and then quarelling with me for not going". George Bernard Shaw and Bertha Newcombe were still corresponding about the performance of his plays in 1925.

Bertha Newcombe - Book Illustrator

Bertha Newcombe had trained as a professional artist at The Slade School of Fine Art In the mid 1870s. During the1880s and 1890s, Bertha Newcombe had received some recognition in the world of fine art, being a noted figurative artist and achieving some success as landscape, portrait and flower painter. However, it appears that most of Bertha's income as a professional artist was derived from book and magazine illustration. Between 1895 and 1897, Bertha Newcombe regularly contributed drawings of church and village life to The English Illustrated Magazine and provided artwork for the fiction magazine The Windsor Magazine.

Bertha Newcombe's most productive period was between 1894 and 1907 when she illustrated classic novels, such as The Mill on the Floss by George Eliot and Mrs Gaskell's 'Cranford' and provided drawings to accompany novels and short stories directed at a juvenile female audience. ( See a list of these novels and short stories in the table above left).

Reviewing the early novels of Orme Agnus (real name John C. Higginbotham), The Bookseller newspaper makes a special mention of "Miss Bertha Newcombe's refined and sympathetic pencil" which supplied illustrations to the book. Bertha Newcombe continued to exhibit her paintings showing a painting entitled 'Primrose Copse' at the Royal Academy in 1905.

Bertha Newcombe after 1907

After 1907, Bertha Newcombe was immersed in the campaign for equal political rights. A member of The Artists Suffrage League, Bertha was engaged in producing pictorial propaganda for the Women's Suffrage Movement. Miss Newcombe had allied herself to the moderate wing of the movement and was hostile towards members of the Women's Social and Political Union or W. S. P. U., commonly known as "Suffragettes". Bertha was a member of The London Society for Women's Suffrage, which was critical of the illegal and violent methods adopted by the Women's Social and Political Union (W. S. P. U.). In 1910, Mrs Emily Lavinia Gifford Hardy (1840-1912), the wife of the novelist Thomas Hardy, wrote to the London Society for Women's Suffrage to complain about a "an unexpected - and uninvited" visit from Miss Bertha Newcombe, who "asserted in a most ill-bred manner that Mrs Hardy had previously belonged to the Militant Set"

By 1913, Bertha Newcombe was a member of the executive committee of the London Society for Women's Suffrage. When the First World War broke out, the executive committee of the London Society for Women's Suffrage organized a Women's Service Bureau which aimed to place women in what were previously regarded as men's jobs, thereby releasing men to serve on the front line. After the First World War, Bertha Newcombe's organisation became the London Society for Women's Service, an agency which sought greater opportunities for women's employment. In 1918, The Qualification of Women Act enfranchised certain classes of women who were over the age of 30. From 1918, Bertha Newcombe was involved in the campaign to secure the vote for women between the ages of 21 and 30.

Bertha Newcombe's Last Years

In the 1920s, Bertha Newcombe invested her money in the Women's Pioneer Housing Association, a non-profit making organisation which aimed to help single women find secure, affordable housing. Bertha Newcombe also supported the Shoreditch Housing Association which was set up in 1934 to provide good housing for the needy.

Bertha Newcombe died at her home at Red Lynch, Tilmore, Petersfield, Hampshire in 1947 at the age of 90. In her will, Miss Newcombe left all her books to the Public Reference Library at Winchester and her paintings, including artwork by her great uncle, the famous watercolour artist Samuel Prout (1783-1852). Miss Newcombe's bequest also included a large sum of money to be "devoted to the housing in flats or rooms of elderly women of limited means" and for the restoration of almshouses which catered for old women.

[ABOVE] Young women practising their metalwork skills at the Women's Service Bureau (circa 1917)
[RIGHT] Logo of the Women's Pioneer  Housing Association, which Bertha Newcombe supported towards the end of her life.

Logo of the Women's Pioneer Housing Association

Book Illustrations Drawn by Bertha Newcombe

Book illustrations drawn by Bertha Newcombe for novels published during the late 1890s and early 1900s. [ LEFT & ABOVE LEFT]  Illustrations for the novel  My Lady Frivol  by Rosa Nouchette Carey (1899). [ABOVE RIGHT & RIGHT] Two Illustrations for the novel  Sarah Tuldon - A Woman Who Had Her Way" by Orme Agnus (1903)

"You dirty pigs!" she cried, "I'll teach 'ee diff'rent" (an illustration from Sarah Tuldon by Orme Agnus (1903)

       

Other Members of the Newcombe Family

Frederick Newcombe was born around 1794 in Bodmin, Cornwall. On 11th November 1821, at the Charles Church in Plymouth Devon, Frederick Newcombe married Hannah Prout (born 1795, Devonport, Devon). After their marriage, the West Country couple moved to London, where Frederick Newcombe, a butcher by trade, eventually set up a "ham and beef" shop. During her twenty year marriage to Frederick Newcombe, Mary Prout gave birth to at least 8 children.

Mrs Hannah Newcombe died in Islington, London, on 23rd August 1842, a few days after her 47th birthday. On 27th December 1843, Frederick Newcombe married his second wife, a widow named Mrs Sarah Watson. By this date, Frederick Newcombe was working in the meat trade in Theberton Street in Islington, North London. In the 1852 edition of the Post Office Directory of London, Frederick Newcombe senior is listed as a "ham & beef dealer" at 1 Theberton Street, Islington. Another Frederick Newcombe, presumably Frederick Newcombe senior's eldest son, is recorded as a "meat salesman" at London's Newgate Market in the same trade directory.

[ABOVE] Frederick Newcombe and Frederick Newcombe senior listed in the 1852 edition of the Post Office Directory of London.

Frederick Newcombe senior died in London in 1853 or 1854. [ Michael Mates, who is descended from Frederick's youngest daughter Eliza Newcombe (1836-1896) believes Frederick Newcombe senior died in London on 11th October 1853, but the death of another Frederick Newcombe is recorded in the London district of Clerkenwell during the 4th Quarter of 1854].

The Children of Frederick Newcombe and Hannah Prout

Frederick Newcombe (born c1794, Bodmin, Cornwall ) married Hannah Prout (born 1795, Devonport, Devon) on 11th November 1821. Frederick Newcombe was the son of Mary and John Newcombe, a button maker of Bodmin, Cornwall. Hannah Prout was the daughter of Mary Cater and Samuel Prout, a naval outfitter of Plymouth, Devon.

Frederick Newcombe and Hannah Prout produced eight children:

1) Frederick Thomas Newcombe (born 1822, Southwark, South London)

2) Samuel Prout Newcombe (1824-1912),

3) Cornelius Prout Newcombe (1825-1913)

4) Ebenezer Prout Newcombe (1828-1901)

5) Charles Thomas Newcombe (born 1830, Clerkenwell, London)

6) Hannah Marie Newcombe (born 1834, London)

7) "Minnie" Mary Anne Newcombe (1834-1907)

8) Eliza Newcombe (1836-1896)

 

Cornelius Prout Newcombe (1825-1913)

Ebenezer Prout Newcombe (1828-1901)

Eliza Newcombe (1836-1896)

Cornelius Prout Newcombe was born in the London parish of St Luke's in 1825, the fourth of eight children born to Frederick Newcombe and Hannah Prout.

In 1848 at Coventry, Cornelius Prout Newcombe married Caroline Tunnicliff (born c1823). Cornelius and Caroline Prout Newcombe settled in Leicester where their son Alfred Cornelius Newcombe was born in 1850. When the 1851 census was taken, Cornelius Prout Newcombe, his wife Caroline and their young son Alfred were residing in Leicester. The following year, Cornelius Prout Newcombe and his family had moved to Islington in North London, where their second child Caroline Newcombe was born during the 2nd Quarter of 1852. Two more children were born in London - Frederick Newcombe, who was born in 1853 or 1854 and Lucy Newcombe who arrived in 1855.

While he was based in London in the early 1850s, Cornelius Prout Newcombe became a partner in Griffiths, Newcombe, & Co., a company of ship owners and insurance brokers with offices in Liverpool and London. The firm of Griffiths, Newcombe, & Co. were also Emigration Agents, arranging the passage of emigrants by ship to Australia (see below). On 21st August 1854,the firm of Griffiths, Newcombe, & Co. filed for bankruptcy.

With the collapse of Griffiths, Newcombe, & Co. in 1854 Cornelius Prout Newcombe changed his career path and became a School Master.

In 1858, Cornelius Prout Newcombe had married for a second time. [The marriage of Cornelius Prout Newcombe and Mary Kirk was registered in Kensington, during the 4th Quarter of 1858]. Cornelius Newcombe's bride was Mary Kirk (born c1821, Warrington, Lancashire).

By 1863, Cornelius Prout Newcombe was running a private boarding school in Bradford Street, Braintree, Essex. Around 1869, Cornelius Prout Newcombe became the Principal of a commercial college in Hornsey. The Post Office Directory of Middlesex, published in 1874, lists Cornelius Prout Newcombe as the proprietor of a commercial college in Middle Lane, Hornsey.

[ABOVE] Cornelius Prout Newcombe listed as the proprietor of The Alexandra Park (Commercial) College in Middle Lane, Hornsey, in the section headed 'SCHOOLS - PRIVATE' in the 1874 edition of the Post Office Directory of Middlesex.

The 1881 census records Cornelius P. Newcombe as a fifty-five year old "Schoolmaster" residing withsixty-one year old Mrs Mary Newcombe, his second wife, and two of their grown-up children at Alexandra Park College, Middle Lane, Hornsey, Middlesex, described as "a Large Boarding and Day School near London".

Towards the end of his teaching career, Cornelius Prout Newcombe travelled to Auckland, New Zealand. In 1885, Cornelius Prout Newcombe was the Principal of the Domain Grammar School, Grafton Road, Auckland. In 1891, Cornelius Prout Newcombe was appointed Headmaster of the Parnell Church of England Grammar School. After the Parnell Church of England Grammar School closed in 1893, he became the Head Teacher at a private school in Symonds Street.

Around 1895, Cornelius Prout Newcombe returned to England. In 1896, Cornelius Prout Newcombe is described in a legal document as a School Master of Muswell Hill, London.

When the census was taken on 31st March 1901, Cornelius Prout Newcombe was recorded as a "Retired School Master" living in Hornsey. Sharing her parents' home was Miss Caroline Newcombe, a forty-eight year old "School Mistress". Frederick Newcombe, Cornelius Prout Newcombe's youngest son, was living elsewhere in Hornsey with his wife Marion (born c1853, Canonbury, London). On the 1901 census return, Frederick Newcombe is described "Schoolmaster", aged 47.

In 1911, Cornelius Prout Newcombe, a widower of 85 was living with his unmarried daughter Miss Caroline Newcombe in Tonbridge, Kent.

Cornelius Prout Newcombe died in Tonbridge, Kent, in 1913 at the age of 87.

 

 

3a

 

 

 

Ebenezer Prout Newcombe was born in London in 1828, the fourth of eight children born to Frederick Newcombe and Hannah Prout. In 1849, at the age of twenty-one, Ebenezer Prout Newcombe sailed for Australia. Ebenezer Prout Newcombe landed at Adelaide in 1849 and the headed for the gold-fields of Victoria.

[ABOVE] Panning for Gold by Samuel Thomas Gill (1818-1880). This English-born artist toured the goldfields of Victoria in the early 1850s. Ebenezer Prout Newcombe arrived in Australia in 1848 to work the goldfields in Victoria, Australia.

On 8th December 1854, Ebenezer Prout Newcombe married Julia Matheson in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia. Presumably, Mrs Julia Newcombe, Ebenezer Prout Newcombe's first wife, died between 1854 and 1858. Ebenezer Prout Newcombe returned to England and married Martha Ann Lever (born c1828) at Braintree, Essex in the Summer of 1858. Ebenezer Prout Newcombe sailed again for Australia on the ship 'Roxburgh Castle' and arrived in the Colony of Victoria in December 1858.

Ebenezer Prout Newcombe joined with James Henry Wheeler to form the partnership of Wheeler & Newcombe, a firm of timber merchants and saw mill proprietors. The partnership was dissolved in May 1871 and Ebenezer Prout Newcombe continued alone as a timber merchant at Sandhurst, Australia.

[ABOVE] An 1857 engraving of Sandhurst, Australia, where Ebenezer Prout Newcombe worked as a timber merchant in the 1860s and early 1870s..

By 1878, Ebenezer Prout Newcombe was earning a living as a timber merchant at St Kilda in the Colony of Victoria.

Ebenezer Prout Newcombe and Martha Ann Laver produced at least six children - Mary Harriett Newcombe (born 1859, Castlemain, Victoria, Australia), Annie Julia Prout Newcombe (born 1862, Castlemain, Victoria, Australia), Emily Grace Newcombe (born 1864, Castlemain, Victoria, Australia), Ada Stallybrass Newcombe (born 1867, Castlemain, Victoria, Australia), Frederick William Newcombe (born 1870,Castlemain, Victoria, Australia) and Bertha Daisie Newcombe (born 1872, Sandhurst, Australia)

Ebenezer Prout Newcombe died at at Spring Gardens, Warrnambool, Victoria, Australia, on 22nd April 1901, aged 72. Ebenezer Prout Newcombe's will shows that he owned real estate valued at £1,410 (pounds) and a personal estate of £5,316 (pounds). Ebenezer Newcombe bequeathed £10 (pounds) to the Presbyterian Missionary Home in Dunedin and £50 (pounds) to St John's Presbyterian Church in Warrnambool. In an obituary which appeared in the local press, Ebenezer Prout Newcombe is described as "one of the most charitable men that ever lived."

 

 

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Eliza Newcombe was born in Clerkenwell, London, on 8th September 1836, the youngest of eight children born to Frederick Newcombe and Hannah Prout. One of three sisters and five brothers, Eliza was christened at the Claremont Independent Chapel in Pentonville on 30th October 1836.

On 11th August 1860, Eliza Newcombe married Charles Moore Jones at the Union Congregational Chapel, Islington, North London. Charles Moore Jones had been born in Islington, North London, in 1837, the son of Elizabeth Sargent and John Daniel Jones, a tanner of Liverpool.

After their marriage, Eliza and her husband Charles Moore Jones settled in Liverpool. Charles and Eliza produced at least 7 children - Frances Mabel (born 1863), John Arthur Frederick (born 1864), Vyvyan D'Ernee (born 1866), Charles Cecil D'Ernee (born 1868), Sydney D'Ernee (born 1868), Burchell Oughton D'Ernee (born 1876) and Marguerite Elise D'Ernee (born 1876).

According to the Dernee Family History website Charles Moore Jones changed the family's surname, first to Jones D'Ernee and then to D'ernee.

At the time of the 1881 census, Charles D'Ernee (formerly Jones) and his family were residing at 42 Kingslake Street, West Derby, near Liverpool, Lancashire. As the Head of Household, Charles D'Ernee is described on the census return as a forty-three year old "Cotton Merchant's Manager". Interestingly, given the involvement of three of Eliza Newcombe's three brothers in the world of commercial photography, Charles and Eliza's eldest daughter is recorded as an eighteen year old "Photographic Artist".

In 1891, Eliza and Charles D'Ernee (formerly Jones) were living at 18 Mount Pleasant, Waterloo, near Liverpool, Lancashire.

Mrs Eliza Jones D'Ernee (formerly Eliza Newcombe) died at her home in Waterloo, Lancashire, on 24th June 1896, aged 59. The cause of death was given as cancer of the uterus.

[ABOVE] A photographic portrait of Eliza Newcombe (1836-1896) taken around the time of her marriage to Charles D'Ernee Jones in 1860.

PHOTO: Courtesy of Michael Mates & Tony Mates

[ABOVE] A photographic portrait of Charles Moore Jones (born 1837, Islington, London) taken around the time of his marriage to Eliza Newcombe  in 1860. After his marriage Charles Moore Jones changed his name to Charles D'Ernee Jones. He later dropped the surname of Jones and was known formally as Charles D'Ernee.

PHOTO: Courtesy of Michael Mates & Tony Mates

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[ABOVE] A report of the court case heard at London's Mansion House in September 1854 involving Cornelius Prout Newcombe of Newcombe, Griffiths and Co., emigration agents, who was accused of "violating Section 44 of the Passengers Act of 1852". The court heard that "a number of passengers, upwards of 136, had paid their passage-money to the prisoner (Cornelius Prout Newcombe) for conveyance to Melbourne by the 'Jane Green', but the ship (which was scheduled to sail on 4th September 1854) did not sail, nor was any other ship provided  so that the emigrants suffered great privations". (The Spectator, 9th September 1854). Newcombe's defence counsel argued that his client could not be sent to prison as he was protected by the Court of Bankruptcy (the firm of Newcombe, Griffiths and Co. had been declared bankrupt on 21st August 1854). However, the magistrate ruled that Newcombe should "refund the passage-money, and pay £10 (pounds) as a compensation, or, in default, be imprisoned for three months with hard labour".

[ABOVE] An 1885 newspaper advertisement for the Domain Grammar School in Grafton Road, Auckland, New Zealand, where Cornelius was the Principal until 1891.

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[ABOVE] Details of the will of Ebenezer Prout Newcombe, who died on Warrambool, Australia on 22nd April 1901, as reported in the  Melbourne Argus (6th August 1901) .
 

[ABOVE] The Ozone Coffee Palace, Warrambool, Australia.  Ebenezer Prout Newcombe probably had a financial interest in Warrambool's Coffee House as he left £100 (pounds) per annum to Thomas Redford as "a voluntary gift for acting as a director in the Ozone Coffee Palace Company". The Ozone Coffee Palace was built in Warrambool in 1890 with the support of the temperance movement, which wanted to combat the influence of the alcohol-selling bars and hotels. The Ozone Coffee Palace proved to be a financial failure. The building was destroyed by fire in 1929.

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The Newcombe /Smorthwaite / Anderton Connection
William Smorthwaite senior (1822-1893)

William Smorthwaite was born in St Albans in 1822. On 11th April 1848, in Barking, Essex, William Smorthwaite married Mary Ann Anderton (born 1819,London), the daughter of William and Mary Anderton. Mary Ann Anderton was the sister of Howard Anderton, who ran a school with Samuel Prout Newcombe.

When Samuel Prout Newcombe first became involved with The London School Photography in 1854, he was a recently widowed school teacher, aged around 30. On 22nd December 1854, Samuel Prout Newcombe married Hannah Hales Anderton, the sister of Howard Anderton (Samuel's teaching colleague and business partner). Through his mariage, Samuel Prout Newcombe became related to Mary Ann Anderton, the wife of William Smorthwaite

William Smorthwaite, who was a baker by trade, became bankrupt in 1857. It appears that Samuel Prout Newcombe consequently invited his relative to join The London School of Photography as a photographer. When the 1861 census was taken, William Smorthwaite, who was residing at 2 Blenheim Place, Marylebone, London, with his wife and family, described himself as a "Photographer". Another relative, William Joseph Anderton (the brother of Samuel Prout Newcombe's wife) was employed to manage the Newgate Street branch of The London School of Photography.

In 1870, Samuel Prout Newcombe decided to retire from his photography business and sold the remaining five London studios of The London School of Photography to William Smorthwaite.

Mrs Emma Smorthwaite (1844-1923)

William Smorthwaite senior's eldest son William Joseph Smorthwaite (born 1849, Romford, Essex), also a professional photographer, had married Emma Read (born 1844, St Albans). William J. Smorthwaite emigrated to Canada to work as a photographic artist in Ontario. After her photographer husband died in Canada, Mrs Emma Smorthwaite returned to England. William Smorthwaite passed the Regent Street branch studio of the London School of Photography to Mrs Emma Smorthwaite, his widowed daughter-in-law. Emma operated the Regent Street studio under the name of Smorthwaite even after she married Charles Alfred Bungey (born 1851, London) in 1876.

William Smorthwaite senior retired to Sussex, where he died in 1893, aged 70. William Smorthwaite senior's daughter-in-law Mrs Emma Bungey (formerly Mrs William Smorthwaite) died in Paddington, London in 1923.

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[ABOVE] Emma Read (born 1844, Redbourne St Jerome, Herts.) in a detail from  family group photograph featuring her mother Mrs Susannah Read and two of Emma's brothers. (See RIGHT). Sometime around 1870, Emma Read had married William Joseph Smorthwaite, the son of the London photographer William Smorthwaite senior (1822-1893). William Joseph Smorthwaite continued his photographic career in Canada, becoming a partner in Smorthwaite & Bird, a firm with a photographic portrait studio at 79 St Paul Street,  St Catharines, Ontario. When William Joseph Smorthwaite died in Canada, Emma returned to England with her two daughters, Margaret and Maud. William Smorthwaite senior, Emma's father-in-law, had recently acquired the photographic portrait studios of The London School of Photography. William Smorthwaite senior handed over the studio at 174 Regent Street to his daughter-in-law, who traded under the name of Mrs Emma Smorthwaite. In 1876, Emma married the artist & photographer Charles Alfred Bungey (born 1851, St. Pancras, London).

Mrs Emma Smorthwaite and the London School of Photography

[ABOVE] A family group photograph showing Mrs Susannah Read (born c1820, St Albans, herts.) and three of her grown-up children. Mrs Susannah Read is seated on the left and her daughter Emma, the widow of Canadian photographer William Joseph Smorthwaite, is seated on the right. The two men in the centre are Emma's brothers. Emma Read married William Joseph Smorthwaite, the son of the London photographer William Smorthwaite senior. In 1875, Emma's brother, Edmund Read (born 1847, St Albans), married William Smorthwaite senior's daughter, Laura Smorthwaite (born 1855, Romford, Essex). Emma Read was twice married. She married William Joseph Smorthwaite around 1870 and this union produced two daughters, Margaret Smorthwaite (born c1871, Ontario, Canada) and Maud Smorthwaite (born c1872, Canada). Emma's second husband , who she wed in 1876, was the  artist & photographer Charles Alfred Bungey (born 1851, St. Pancras, London). This second marriage produced William Alfred Bungey (born 1878, Paddington), Atheline Emma Bungey (born 1881, Paddington) and Constance Amy Bungey (born 1883, Paddington).

PHOTO: Courtesy of Peter West

[ABOVE] The reverse of a carte-de-visite portrait produced under the name of Mrs Emma Smorthwaite at 174 Regent Street, London, formerly a studio belonging to The London School of Photography. The Regent Street studio was passed to Mrs Emma Smorthwaite around 1876 by her father-in-law William Smorthwaite senior (1822-1893). The London branch studios of The London School of Photography had been acquired by  William Smorthwaite senior when Samuel Prout Newcombe (c1824-1912),the original proprietor, retired in 1870. Emma operated the Regent Street studio under the name of "E. Smorthwaite" even after she married the London photographer  Charles Alfred Bungey (1851-1917) in 1876.

 
To read further information about the Newcombe and Jones D'Ernee Families and to find out more about the descendants of Eliza Newcombe and Charles Jones D'Ernee visit The Dernee Family History website by clicking on the link below:

The Dernee Family History

 

The Prout Family and the Newcombe Family of London

[ABOVE] The Devonshire-born watercolour artist Samuel Prout (1783-1852). There is a clear connection between the Prout Family of Devon and the Newcombe Family of London. Charles Thomas Newcombe's' father, Frederick Newcombe, who was born in Cornwall around 1794, married Hannah Prout (born 1795, Devonport, Devon) at the Charles Church, Plymouth, Devon, in 1821. Hannah Prout  appears to have been a younger sister of the artist Samuel Prout.

[ABOVE] Beach at Low Tide (Hastings) by Samuel Prout (1783-1852). Samuel Prout Newcombe, who was probably related to the artist Samuel Prout, owned several works by this well-known watercolour artist. The artist and portrait painter Bertha Newcombe (1857-1947),  daughter of Samuel Prout Newcombe, left five works by Samuel Prout to the Southampton Art Gallery when she died.
 

There is a clear connection between the Prout Family of Devon and the Newcombe Family of London. The artist Samuel Prout was born in the dockyard city of Plymouth on 17th September 1783, the fourth of fourteen children born to Mary Cater and Samuel Prout senior, a naval outfitter. Charles Thomas Newcombe's' father, Frederick Newcombe, who was born in Cornwall around 1794, married Hannah Prout (born 1795, Devonport, Devon) at the Charles Church, Plymouth, Devon, in 1821. Hannah Prout appears to have been a younger sister of the artist Samuel Prout. When Hannah Prout was christened at the Independent Chapel, Princes Street, Devonport, on 27th September 1795, her parents were recorded as Mary & Samuel Prout. Frederick Newcombe's sister Sarah Newcombe (born 1790, Bodmin, Cornwall) married John Prout (1782-1866) at Stoke Damerel, Devon on 22nd June, 1820. John Prout, who was the brother of Hannah Prout (Frederick Newcombe's future wife) was christened at the Independent Chapel, Princes Street, Devonport, on 21st July 1782.

The artist and photographer Edgar Prout (born 1839, London), who entered into a business partnership with the London photographer Charles Thomas Newcombe around 1865, was the son of Maria Heathilla Marsh and John Skinner Prout (born 1805, Plymouth, Devon) a nephew of the watercolour artist Samuel Prout. Two of Edgar Prout's brothers, Victor Albert Prout (born 1835, Bristol) and Frank Prout (born c1846, Tasmania) also worked as professional photographers in London.

[ABOVE] The trade plate which was printed on the reverse of carte-de-visite portraits produced at the London studio owned by Charles Thomas Newcombe and his business partner  Edgar Prout (1839-1900). Edgar Prout took over  Newcombe's Regent Street studio in 1866. [ABOVE] The trade plate of London photographer Victor Albert Prout (1835-1877). Victor A. Prout ran the photographic portrait studio at 15 Baker Street, London, from 1862 until 1865. In 1866, Victor Prout travelled to Australia where he worked as a photographer and produced  photographic apparatus. [ABOVE] The Devonshire-born artist John Skinner Prout (1805-1876),  nephew of the watercolour artist Samuel Prout (1783-1852), was the father of  three London photographers - Victor, Edgar and Frank Prout. John Skinner Prout  spent 8 years in Australia.

The Newcombe Family were obviously proud of their connection with the well-known watercolour artist Samuel Prout (1783-1852). Three of Frederick and Hannah Newcombe's sons were christened with the middle name "Prout" -  Samuel Prout Newcombe (born 1824, London), Cornelius Prout Newcombe (born 1825, London) and Ebenezer Prout Newcombe (born 1828, London). Samuel Prout Newcombe owned several works by Samuel Prout and when Samuel Newcombe's daughter, the artist and portrait painter Bertha Newcombe, died in 1947, five works by the artist Samuel Prout were left to the Southampton Art Gallery.

Both the Newcombe family and the Prout family had associations with the Sussex seaside town of Hastings. The watercolour artist Samuel Prout moved down to Hastings for the sake of his health in 1836 and spent eight years in the town. London photographer Charles Thomas Newcombe opened a branch studio in Hastings in 1863 and in 1881 Samuel Prout Newcombe and his family were boarding at Mrs Ann Phillips' lodging house in Exmouth Place, Hastings.

[ABOVE] A sketch of fishermen and their boats on Hastings beach, drawn in pencil and watercolour by Samuel Prout around 1840. The artist's signature "S. Prout" appears in the bottom left-hand corner of the picture. The artist Samuel Prout lived in the Sussex seaside town of Hastings between 1836 and 1844.

[ABOVE] Hastings Fishing Boats by Samuel Prout (1783-1852). This painting was probably created during Samuel Prout's stay in  the seaside town of Hastings between 1836 and 1844.

 

The Prout Brothers - Photographic Artists active in London during the 1860s

Edgar Prout (1839-1900)

Edgar Prout was born in London in 1839, the son of Maria Heathilla Marsh and John Skinner Prout (born 1805, Plymouth, Devon), a nephew of the watercolour artist Samuel Prout. Born in London's Euston Road on 30th May 1839, Edgar Prout was christened at the Old Church in St Pancras on 11th January 1840. Edgar Prout had at least nine siblings including Matilda Prout (born 1829), Anna Maria Prout (born 1831), Rosa Heathilla Prout (born 1833), Frederick Prout (born 1834), Victor Albert Prout (born 1835), Edwin Prout (born 1837), Agnes Prout (born 1838), Mary Prout (born c1843) and Francis John Prout (born c1846).

Edgar Prout's father John Skinner Prout (1805-1876) was a watercolour landscape artist. Born in Plymouth on 19th December 1805, John Skinner Prout was a largely self-taught artist who specialised in the production of topographical views of ancient monuments and picturesque ruins (e.g. Antiquities of Bristol, The Castles and Abbeys of Monmouthshire). In 1828, John Skinner Prout married Maria Heathilla Marsh. This union produced at least eight children. Three of his sons - Victor Albert Prout (born 1835, Bristol), Edgar Prout (born 1839, London) and Frank Prout (born c1846, Tasmania) later worked as professional photographers in London. In 1840, John Skinner Prout and his family set sail for Australia, arriving in Sydney at the end of that year. During his eight years in Australia, John Skinner Prout produced sketches and lithographs of Sydney, Melbourne and Van Diemen's Land (Tasmania). John Skinner Prout's youngest son, Francis John Prout (Frank Prout) was born in Tasmania around 1846. John Skinner Prout and his family returned to England around 1848.

On 1st June 1861, Edgar Prout married Elizabeth Louisa Shaw (born 1840, Chelsea) at the Old Church in St Pancras. A son was born to the couple on 16th March 1862 and the baby boy was named Edgar after his father at the christening ceremony which took place at the Old Church, St Pancras, on 27th April 1862. A daughter, Lizzie Prout, was born in St Pancras towards the end of 1866.

Around 1865, Edgar Prout entered into a business partnership with Charles Thomas Newcombe (born 1830, London), a relative and an established professional photographer with a portrait studio at 109 Regent Street, London. On 13th February 1866, the partnership between Edgar Prout and Charles Thomas Newcombe was dissolved and Edgar Prout took over the running of Charles Newcombe's studio. From February 1866 until 1867, Edgar Prout operated the studio at 109 Regent Street under the name of Edgar Prout & Co. In 1867, the photographic studio at 109 Regent Street was sold to the London photographer Henry Flather (1839-1901).

In 1868, Edgar Prout acquired Richard Lambert Allan's photographic studio at 13 Murray Street in the Camden Town district of London. When the 1881 census was taken, Edgar Prout, his wife Elizabeth and their two children, Edgar, a ninteen year old clerk, and Lizzie, a fourteen year old school girl, were residing in living quarters attached to Prout's studio at 13 Murray Street, Camden Town, London. On the 1881 census return, Edgar Prout is described as a "Photographer", aged 40. Edgar Prout remained at 13 Murray Street until 1887. From 1888 until his death in 1900, Edgar Prout ran a photographic portrait studio at 76 St Paul's Road, Camden Town.

Edgar Prout's only son Edgar Prout junior died in St Pancras, London, in 1884 at the age of 21. Edgar Prout senior died at his home in St Pancras in 1900 at the age of 61.[The death of Edgar Prout was registered in the district of St Pancras during the 3rd Quarter of 1900]. Edgar Prout's daughter Lizzie Prout never married and died in 1926 at the age of 60. Mrs Elizabeth Louisa Prout, Edgar Prout's widow, died in Edmonton in 1929 at the age of 88.


Victor Albert Prout  (1835-1877)

Victor Albert Prout was born in Bristol on 9th December 1835, the son of Maria Heathilla Marsh and John Skinner Prout, a watercolour artist and lithographer. John Skinner Prout had married Maria Heathilla Marsh, the daughter of John and Ann Marsh of Sidmouth on 19th June 1828. Victor Albert Prout, was John Skinner Prout's eldest surviving son. Victor's elder brother Frederick Prout (born 1834) had died aged 10 in March 1845 when the family were living in Tasmania.

In 1860, Victor Albert Prout married Amy Sarah Barber (born c1832, London). When the census was taken on 7th April 1861, Victor Albert Prout and his wife were living at 6 Camden Terrace West in the St Pancras district of London. At the time of the 1861 census, Victor Prout was working as a professional photographer. Between 1862 and 1864, Victor Albert Prout was the proprietor of a photographic portrait studio at 15 Baker Street, Portman Square, London.  By 1865, Edgar Prout and his wife were residing at Manor House, East Molesey, Surrey. Only 13 miles from London, East Molesey was situated between Walton-on-Thames and Kingston-upon-Thames. Victor Prout's daughter, Violet Prout was born at East Molesey around 1865.

As a young boy, Victor Prout had visited Australia with his parents and siblings. In 1866, Edgar Prout returned to Australia and established himself as a professional photographer and portrait painter in Sydney. Edgar and Amy Prout's second  daughter, Mary Prout, was born in Sydney, Australia, around 1867.

Victor Prout and his family returned to England around 1874. By 1877, Victor Prout was residing in Sussex. Victor Albert Prout died in the Sussex town of Lewes during the 2nd Quarter of 1877, at the age of 41.

[ABOVE] The Quay, Hobart Town, Tasmania, (c1846), an engraving taken from a drawing by the Devon-born artist John Skinner Prout (1805-1876). John Skinner Prout, who spent 8 years in Australia, was the father of three London-based photographers - Victor, Edgar and Frank Prout. In 1866, John Skinner Prout's eldest surviving son Victor Albert Prout returned to Australia  where he worked as a  photographer, first with the Freeman Brothers of Sydney and later at his own studio in Castlereagh Street, Sydney. [ABOVE] The trade plate of Victor A. Prout of 15 Baker Street, Portman Square, London, taken from the reverse of a carte-de-visite portrait dating from around 1864. Although primarily a portrait photographer, Victor Albert Prout is perhaps best known for his views of the River Thames, which in 1862 were published as a portfolio of 36 photographs in The Thames from London to Oxford.

Frank Prout (1846-1871)

Francis ("Frank") John Prout was born in Hobart Town, Tasmania around 1846, the son of Maria Heathilla Marsh and John Skinner Prout, an English watercolour artist and lithographer who worked in Australia between 1840 and 1849.

Frank Prout's elder brothers, Victor Albert Prout (born 1835, Bristol) and Edgar Prout (born 1839, London) had become professional photographers. When the 1871 census was taken, Frank Prout was living with his parents and two unmarried sisters at 4 Leighton Crescent, Leighton Road, St Pancras, London. On the census return, Frank's father, John Skinner Prout, is described as an "Artist & Landscape Painter", while twenty-five year old Frank Prout is recorded as a "Photographer". It is likely that Frank Prout worked alongside his brother Edgar Prout at one of his photographic studios in London. David Webb, the London Photo Historian believes Frank Prout was briefly in a business partnership with Edgar Prout at 309 Regent Street, London, operating under the name of Prout Brothers and trading as the Royal Polytechnic Photographic Company. Another possibility is that Frank Prout was part of the photographic firm of Prout & Mills, which ran a studio at 22 Newman Street, near Oxford Street, London between 1870 and 1871.

Frank Prout died in the St Pancras district of London towards the end of 1871 at the young age of 25. [The death of Francis Prout was registered in the London district of St Pancras during the 4th Quarter of 1871].

[ABOVE] A carte-de-visite portrait of an unknown man photographed by Edgar Prout of 109 Regent Street, London (c1866). Edgar Prout joined the photographer Charles Thomas Newcombe at his Regent Street studio in 1865. From February 1866 until 1867, Edgar Prout was in charge of the photographic portrait studio at 109 Regent Street. A year or so later, Edgar Prout sold the studio to the London photographer Henry Father ( 1839-1901).

[ABOVE] The trade plate of Prout & Newcombe of 109 Regent Street, London. Twenty-six year old Edgar Prout had entered into a business partnership with his relative Charles Thomas Newcombe in 1865.

[ABOVE] The trade plate of Edgar Prout & Co. of 109 Regent Street, London, the former studio of Charles Thomas Newcombe. Related to the Newcombe family, Edgar Prout had entered into a business partnership with Charles Thomas Newcombe in 1865. After the partnership with Charles Newcombe was dissolved in February 1866,  Edgar Prout took over  Newcombe's Regent Street studio. After a year or so, Edgar Prout sold the studio at 109 Regent Street to the London photographer Henry Flather.

[ABOVE] The trade plate of Henry Flather who purchased C. T. Newcombe's studio at 109 Regent Street from Edgar Prout in 1867.

       

Carte-de-visite Portraits by Edgar Prout and Victor Albert Prout

[ABOVE] The reverse of a carte-de-visite portrait by  Edgar Prout of 109 Regent Street, London, the former studio of Charles Thomas Newcombe. (c1866). [ABOVE] A carte-de-visite portrait of an unknown woman by Edgar Prout of 109 Regent Street, London (c1866). [ABOVE] The reverse of a carte-de-visite portrait by Victor Albert Prout of 15 Baker Street, Portman Square, London (c1864). [ABOVE] A carte-de-visite portrait of an unknown man by Victor Albert Prout of 15 Baker Street, Portman Square, London (c1864).

 

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Acknowledgements & Sources

Thanks to Thanks to David Webb, the London photo-historian, for providing additional information relating to the Newcombe family of photographers. Thanks to Geoff Dernee, Michael Mates and Jillian Trethewey of the Dernee Family History website for proving further information on the Newcombe and Jones D'Ernee Families. Thanks also to Tony Mates of Seattle for providing additional information about the connection between the Prout and Newcombe families of artists and photographers. I am grateful to Peter West for providing family history information which showed the family connection between Samuel Prout Newcombe and members of the Smorthwaite and Anderton families. Peter West is the great, great grandson of William Smorthwaite senior (1822-1893) who took over the London School of Photography studios around 1870.

SOURCES : Books : A Directory of London Photographers, 1841-1908 compiled by Michael Pritchard (PhotoResearch, 1986, 1994); Lancashire Professional Photographers, 1840-1940  by Gillian Jones (PhotoResearch, 2004)  ; Primary Sources :  Kelly's Post Office Directory for Sussex (1866,;; Post Office Directory of Middlesex (1874) ; Kelly's Directory of  ; Kelly's Directory of  ; Kelly's London Suburban Directory (); Post Office London County Suburbs Directory () ; Census Returns: 1851, 1861, 1871, 1881, 1891, 1901 & 1911;  Websites : Database of 19th Century Photographers and Allied Trades in London: 1841-1901 on the website photoLondon

 

Newcombe Galleries

Photographs produced by The London Portrait Gallery (Frederick Thomas Newcombe)

Charles Thomas Newcombe of London - Photographic Gallery

Charles Thomas Newcombe of Hastings - Photographic Gallery

The London School of Photography (Samuel Prout Newcombe) -  Photographic Gallery

 

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