Size
Date
Country
Artist
Sitter
Case
Notes

1/9
ca 1856
Cambridge, UK
William Nichols
Unknown
Wall case
"Prince's Patent"

Notes

William Nichols, born 1815 had three children:

Mary 1835
Thomas Herbert 1838-1874
Edward William 1845

Nichols started as a bookbinder and engraver. In August 1844 he was the first to get a Beard license for Cambridgeshire to take daguerreotypes at St Mary's Passage. Readers were informed that "photography is no flatterer, it paints us as we are, with every wrinkle and
every stray hair plainly marked" but the Cambridge Chronicle was confident that "success will attend upon the enterprise in this interesting branch of science". They would be proven right.

On December 14th 1861 Deerfoot, a Native American, visited and sat for his likeness. He would later meet with Queen Victoria and Albert.

In December 1862 Nichols held an exhibition of his work, which was described as follows: "for their beauty of colour, and accuracy of representation, they were the theme of admiration by all who witnessed them."

July 1863 - "The "sand grouse", a rare bird, is now in the possession of mr S. B. Saville, naturalist, to whom it had been confided for preservation, and where it may be seen. Mr Saville has had the honor of forwarding to her majesty, one of mr Nichols' photographs of the bird, the receipt of which was duly acknowledged."

More exhibitions followed, including a portrait of the Mayor in 1864, which "is strikingly correct. The lens used for the execution of the portrait is of new construction, from the firm of voightlander and son, and of superior manufacture."

In October 1864 his sons join the firm. Thomas Herbert Nichols is said to have worked in New York and Philadelphia, which might explain why some of Nichols' work popped up in America, including the ambrotype of the woman below.

The frames were made by son Edward William Nichols. Daughter Mary became a bookbinder.

Nichols gave photography workshops and held magic lantern slide parties. Robert Hills junior later took over his studio.

Prince's Patent

On September 5th 1856 John Johnston was the first to issue a patent for japanned iron plates (tintypes). He described the invention as follows.

"I take a piece of sheet iron (charcoal iron by preference) and cut and roll it to the desired size, length, and thickness by any of the known means of rolling and cutting plate iron; I then subject one side of such said strips or pieces of metal to the well-known process of japanning, as at present practised of japanning metal, taking care to keep such japanned surface free from grease of any kind. These japanned strips are then cut to the required width, in accordance with the different sizes of plates used by photographic artists. In using the above plates for taking pictures of portraits upon, the process is similar in all respects to that hitherto employed in using glass, with this advantage, that by the use of japanned metal plates the necessity for blacking the back of the picture is dispendsed with, and a better pictorial effect is produced by taking the picture directly upon the japanned black surface instead of having the thickness of the plate between the picture and the black back ground."

His patent was witnessed by Alexander Prince, agent for patents, 4 Trafalgar Square, Charing Cross.

Nichols worked with the newest methods, so he may have used one of Johnston's plates, making this one of the earliest tintypes ever made. I've never come across another with Prince's patent stamped into it.