The Ricardo Album

Library of Additional Resources

Contents

• Pictures and Documents
• Provenance of The Ricardo Album
• Web Links
• Album of Historical Importance
• General Resources
• Bibliography and Further Reading List
• Biographical Note
• Acknowledgements

Pictures and Documents

• Four photographs in The Ricardo Album have been confirmed as the earliest known photographs of cricketers taken at Lord’s Ground
• Album portraits, portrait albums and portrait photographers – some early advertisements and articles
• High House, Campsey Ashe, the seat of John George Sheppard
• Funeral of J. G. Sheppard and contents of his will
• The sale of the late Mr. J. G. Sheppard’s effects
• The sale of the Campsey Ashe estate
• The elopement of Lady Rose Somerset and Captain Francis Lovell
• The Old Stagers (Read Aloud)
• On Portraits of Women of the Theatre in The Ricardo Album (Read Aloud)
• An advertisement for “Grand Amateur Theatricals” at Melton Mowbray
• Reviews of “Grand Amateur Theatricals” at Melton Mowbray
• The Eversfields of Denne House
• Stereoview of Group of European Lady and Japanese Attendants, at the Vice-Consulate, at Kanagawa, 1859
• Attack on the first British Legation to Japan
• Portrait of Captain Francis “Punch” Howard Vyse taken in Japan in 1862
• Stories about Captain Francis “Punch” Howard Vyse in Paris
• Death in Paris of “Punch” Vyse
• Vivian v. Vivian and the Marquis of Waterford
• Clonegam Church and the memorial to Florence Grosvenor Rowley
• Entry in Lady Paget’s memoirs
• Sir Augustus and Lady Paget’s silver wedding portrait in Vienna
• Edward Tredcroft – A Sporting Life
• Shooting party
• The last “Light Brigade” officer dies
• Governor’s cottage, Gibraltar
• Lord Dunmore in the Kirghiz dress he always wore on the Pamirs; some sketches made by Lord Dunmore during the expedition; a map showing the route from Rawal Pindi to Samarkand; and part of a paper Lord Dunmore read before the Royal Geographical Society in which he gives a summary of his expedition

Provenance of The Ricardo Album

• Mrs. Charlotte Ricardo, compiler circa 1860, owner until date unknown
• Bill Jay, owner until 1998, acquisition date unknown
• David Morrison, owner, by sale, 1998-2013
• Myrna Goldware, owner, by sale, 2013

The Ricardo Album is described in:

1. Rinhart, George R., “Photograph Albums”, Studio International Journal of Modern Art, Special Issue Art and Photography, July/August 1975, p. vii.
2. Rinhart, George R., Catalogue 9, Fine Photographic Art and Rare Books, 1975, no. 40. $4,500 Source: Dealer.
3. Welling, William, “Determining the Value of Nineteenth-Century Photograph Albums”, Collectors’ Guide to Nineteenth-Century Photographs, New York and London: Collier Books and Collier Macmillan Publishers, 1976, p. 94, no. 4. $4,500 Source: Dealer.
4. Djabri, Susan C., “Edward Tredcroft - a Sporting Life”, Horsham Heritage Journal, Spring 2014, Issue no. 22, pp. 2-26.
5. Djabri, Susan C., “The Ricardo Album Website”, Horsham Heritage Journal, Spring 2015, Issue no. 23, pp. 62-65.
6. Smith, Paul, “Through A Glass Brightly”, MCC (Marylebone Cricket Club) Magazine, Autumn/Winter 2015, Issue no. 12, pp. 5, 32-35.
7. Booth, Lawrence, editor. “Cricketana”, Wisden Cricketers’ Almanack 2016, London: Bloomsbury Publishing, pp. 169-170.
8. Booth, Lawrence, editor. “Cricketana”, The Shorter Wisden 2016: The best writing from Wisden Cricketers’ Almanack 2016, London: Bloomsbury Publishing.
9. Togo, Erika, Umoreta Rekishi: A Buried History In Search of a Retainer of Ueda Domain Who Learned Western Horsemanship in Yokohama at the End of Edo Era, 埋もれた歴史 幕末横浜で西洋馬術を学んだ上田藩士を追って, 2020, pp. 51, 315, 321.
10. Rubio Diaz, Alberto, Viaje a la Extraordinaria Historia de los Ingleses de la Old England House, Madrid: Río de Tinta Books, 2023, pp. 242-243.
11. Carpenter, Nicola. “The Ricardos of Ray Mead Cottage.” Beneath Thy Feet, Secrets From The Grave, Blogger.com, 26 May 2024, https://beneaththyfeet.blogspot.com/2024/05. Accessed July 30, 2024.
12. The Ricardo Album, with a detailed commentary on all the photographs, can be viewed online at www.ricardophotoalbum.com.

Web Links

• Bill Jay on Photography
• The Bill Jay collection at the Center for Creative Photography
• Do Not Bend: The Photographic Life of Bill Jay, A Documentary Film
• The Library of Nineteenth-Century Photography
• Camille Silvy – Photographer of the Victorian Age
• Search the Camille Silvy collection at the National Portrait Gallery
• Diplomat in Japan, by Sir Ernest Mason Satow
• Attack on the first British Legation to Japan
• The Japan Times – Skeletons in the academic closet
• Journeyings in the Pamirs and Central Asia, by the Earl of Dunmore
• The biography, works and correspondence of David Ricardo at the Online Library of Liberty
• The Life and Economics of David Ricardo
• The biography of John Lewis Ricardo at Notes on the History of Stoke-on-Trent
• Distant Writing: A History of the Telegraph Companies in Britain between 1838 and 1868
• Extracts from the Private Letters of the Late Sir William Fothergill Cooke …, Also, a Memoir
• Lord Berners: The Last Eccentric
• Amateur Clubs and Actors
• Amateur Theatricals
• The Wandering Minstrels Orchestra (1860-1898)
• Lost Heritage – a memorial to the lost country houses of England
• Naval Architecture: James Pratt’s Classic, Traditional & Spirit of Tradition Vessels
• The Yachtsman magazine 1892-39 re-issued in digital format
• Edward Chandos Leigh: A Cricketing Journey from Stoneleigh Abbey to Lords
• Wisden Cricketers’ Almanack: Four photos in The Ricardo Album taken in 1859 are two decades older than any other photographic record of players on the field at Lord’s

Album of Historical Importance

It was not until about 1861 that photograph albums became available in England, and the Ricardo album dates from that period. The need for albums arose because there was then a huge craze around the world, which started in France, in 1859, for collecting cartes-de-visite (literally, “visiting cards”). These were portraits printed on thin paper, approximately 57 × 89 mm (2 1/4 × 3 1/2″), mounted on a thicker paper card, approximately 64 × 100 mm (2 1/2 × 4″). Cartes-de-visite could be put in carte-de-visite albums produced with slots which accommodated them. In England alone, during their heyday (called “cartomania”), hundreds of millions of cartes-de-visite were sold annually. They could be acquired at stationers, booksellers, railway stations, photographic clubs and photographers’ studios, and they were traded and exchanged among visitors and friends. Unmounted paper portraits, that were similar in size to cartes-de-visite, but were applied to the pages with glue, were for a different type of album. The Ricardo album is that style of album.

In the early 1860s, Victorian albums functioned like society albums, rather than family albums. They might include portraits of royalty, gentry, statesmen, clergymen, scientific and literary men, theatrical and operatic celebrities, and one’s family and friends. Essentially, they reflected their owner’s interests. They were both public and personal. The Ricardo album mostly has photographs of people who were a part of the lives of the Ricardos and includes few photographs of family members. The album also gives us some intimate glimpses into the Ricardos’ family life at Ray Mead Cottage with their friends. To be fair, however, it is predominantly Albert Ricardo’s interests which shape the whole album. There are many photographs in the album of Albert Ricardo’s fellow cricketers in the I Zingari team, who were aristocratic gentlemen amateurs; some of whom also performed with him in amateur dramatics, and many of whom were members of the Guards regiments serving in the Household Brigade at Windsor Castle, which was only four miles from where the Ricardos lived. Denne Park, Badminton, and Croxteth Hall, which had grounds on which Albert Ricardo’s fellow cricketers played, are among the country houses in the album.

The Ricardo album is of particular interest because the people and places have been identified, and the photographs have remained together. Were it not for that, much of their meaning would be lost: Something has to survive in context! The Ricardo album is itself a representation of the Victorian era. In addition to depicting the world of the upper class in the late 1850s and early 1860s, it is a visual record of architecture, fashion, sport and theatre. The Ricardo album contains some of the earliest cricketing photographs, some of the earliest photographs of theatrical performances, photographs of several individuals, who, during the 19th century, played prominent or interesting roles, and it contains rare photographs of Japan. Besides all of this, we can reconstruct something of the life of a family which is, at the core, the driving force of the album. The Ricardo album is like a message in a bottle that links the future we know and the past that Charlotte Ricardo has preserved for us.

It is hoped, moreover, that the text captions provided will render it easier for users of this website, who are interested in such matters, with any research they may undertake, by relieving them from a large amount of preliminary detail. I need hardly say I shall be very thankful for any corrections or additional information.

A note about the photographs:

Almost all of the photographs in the Ricardo album are albumen prints. The 8 large theatricals, the photographs taken in Japan, and a few others, are calotypes. Of the 268 photographs in the album, there are over 120 studio portraits that are carte-de-visite size; more than 40 of them were taken by Camille Silvy, who Sir Cecil Beaton called the “Gainsborough of commercial photographers.” The album also contains more than 40 portraits by Messrs Day of Piccadilly, as well as portraits by Southwell Brothers and A.A.E. Disdéri. The remaining photographs, in most instances, are the work of gifted, anonymous amateurs, and some as yet unidentified studio photographers.

General Resources

• Seiberling, Grace, and Carolyn Bloore. Amateurs, photography, and the mid-Victorian imagination. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1986.
• Siegel, Elizabeth, and Patrizia Bello. Playing with pictures: the art of Victorian photocollage. Chicago: Art Institute of Chicago, 2009.

Bibliography and Further Reading List

• Auerbach, Nina. Private theatricals: the lives of the Victorians. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1990.
• Baldwin, Gordon, Malcolm Daniel, Sarah Greenough. All the mighty world: the photographs of Roger Fenton, 1852-1860. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2004.
• Barton, Roger Neil. “The birth of telegraphic news in Britain 1847-68.” New Media 16:4 (2010): 379-406.
• Beaton, Cecil. British photographers. London: W. Collins, 1944.
• Bede, Cuthbert. Photographic pleasures; popularly portrayed with pen & pencil. Garden City, N.Y.: Amphoto, 1973.
• Bennett, Terry. Photography in Japan, 1853-1912. Tokyo: Tuttle, 2006.
• Bennett, Terry. The Illustrated London News complete record of the opening and modernization of Japan, 1853-1899. Folkestone: Global Oriental, 2004.
• Berners, Gerald Hugh Tyrwhitt. The Château de Résenlieu. Chappaqua, N.Y.: Turtle Point Press and Helen Marx Books, 2000.
• Berners, Gerald Hugh Tyrwhitt. First childhood. Chappaqua, N.Y.: Turtle Point Press and Helen Marx Books, 1998.
• Blew, William C.A. The Quorn hunt and its masters. London: J.C. Nimmo, 1899.
• Bloore, Caroline, and Grace Seiberling. A vision exchanged. London: Victoria and Albert Museum, 1985.
• Booth, Mark Howarth. Camille Silvy: photographer of modern life. Los Angeles: J. Paul Getty Museum, 2010.
• Chanan, Noel. William, Earl of Craven & the art of photography. Tiverton: Halsgrove, 2006.
• Colvin, Howard. A biographical dictionary of British architects, 1600-1840. 3rd ed. New Haven: Published for the Paul Mellon Centre for Studies in British Art by Yale University Press, 1995.
• Cortazzi, Hugh. Victorians in Japan: in and around the treaty ports. London: Athlone Press, 1987.
• Denney, John. Respect and consideration: Britain in Japan 1853-1868 and beyond; how Britain helped Japan move from feudalism to join the modern community of nations. Leicester: Radiance Press, 2011.
• Di Bello, Patrizia. Women’s Albums and Photography in Victorian England: Ladies, Mothers and Flirts. Aldershot, England: Ashgate, 2007.
• Dunmore, Charles Adolphus Murray. The Pamirs; being a narrative of a year’s expedition on horseback and on foot through Kashmir, western Tibet, Chinese Tartary, and Russian Central Asia. London: J. Murray, 1893.
• Early photographic images and related material. London: Sotheby’s Belgravia, 1975.
• Elliot, W. G. Amateur clubs and actors. London: E. Arnold, 1898.
• Escott, T. H. S. Society in the country house. London: T.F. Unwin, 1907.
• Fari, Simone. Victorian Telegraphy before Nationalization. Basingstoke, Hampshire: Palgrave Macmillan, 2015.
• ‘From today painting is dead’: the beginnings of photography. London: Arts Council of Great Britain, 1975.
• “Geographia” authentic atlas and guide to London and suburbs. London: Geographia, 1923.
• Gernsheim, Alison. Victorian & Edwardian fashion a photographic survey. New York: Dover Publications, 1981.
• Gernsheim, Helmut, and Alison Gernsheim. The history of photography from the camera obscura to the beginning of the modern era. New York: McGraw-Hill, 1969.
• Harper, Charles George. Thames valley villages. London: Chapman & Hall, 1910.
• Keyser, Arthur Louis. People and places; a life in five continents. London: J. Murray, 1922.
• Klauber, Laurence Monroe, and Karen Harvey McClung. Rattlesnakes, their habits, life histories, and influence on mankind. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1982.
• Leigh, E. Chandos, and F. Robert Bush. Bar, bat and bit recollections & experiences. London: J. Murray, 1913.
• Moholy, Lucia. A hundred years of photography, 1839-1939. Harmondsworth, Middlesex, Eng.: Penguin Books Ltd., 1939.
• Moore, George Greville. Memories of an old Etonian, 1860-1912. London: Hutchinson & Co., 1919.
• Paget, Walburga Ehrengarde Helena von Hohenthal. Embassies of other days, and further recollections. New York: George H. Doran Company, 1923.
• Pollock, Walter Herries, and Juliet Pollock. Amateur theatricals. London: Macmillan and Co., 1879.
• Russell, William Howard, and Nicolas Bentley. Russell’s despatches from the Crimea, 1854-1856. [1st American Ed.] New York: Hill and Wang, 1967 1966.
• Satow, Ernest Mason. Diplomat in Japan. Berkeley, Calif.: Stone Bridge Press, 2006.
• Standage, Tom. The Victorian Internet: the remarkable story of the telegraph and the nineteenth century’s on-line pioneers. New York: Walker and Co., 1998.
• Studio International Journal of Modern Art, July/August 1975.
• Sykes, Christopher Simon. The Golden age of the country house. New York: Mayflower Books, 1980.
• Taylor, Roger, Larry J. Schaaf. Impressed by light: British photographs from paper negatives, 1840-1860. New York: Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2007.
• The real thing: an anthology of British photographs, 1840-1950. London: The Council, 1975.
• Tyas, Robert. The sentiment of flowers, or, Language of flora: with twelve coloured plates. London: Robert Tyas, 1839.
• Tyrwhitt, Robert Philip. Notices and remains of the family of Tyrwhitt: originally seated in Northumberland... (A.D. 1067 to 1862).
• Walker, John Wesley. A history of Maidenhead. 2nd ed. Maidenhead: Thames Valley Press, 1971.
• Warrillow, Ernest J. D. A sociological history of the city of Stoke-on-Trent. Stoke-on-Trent, Staffs: Etruscan Publications, 1960.
• Welling, William. Collectors’ guide to nineteenth-century photographs. New York: Macmillan, 1976.
• Williams, Harold S. Foreigners in Mikadoland. Tokyo, Rutland, Vt.: C.E. Tuttle Co., 1963.
• Williams, Harold S. Shades of the past; or, Indiscreet tales of Japan. 1st ed. Tokyo, Japan: C.E. Tuttle Co., 1959.
• Williams, Harold S. Tales of the foreign settlements in Japan. Tokyo: C.E. Tuttle Co., 1959.

Biographical Note

Susan C. Djabri (M.A. (Hons) Edin. in English Language and Literature) graduated from the University of Edinburgh in 1959. She worked as an interviewer on a topical affairs programme, Scope, at BBC Radio Scotland 1959-1960, and as a research assistant in the Information Research Department of the Foreign and Commonwealth Office 1961-1971. After her marriage to Waddah Djabri, a Syrian consulting electrical engineer, in October 1971, she lived in Beirut, Lebanon and Saudi Arabia; and had two sons born in 1972 and 1974.

Since moving to Horsham, Sussex in 1992 she became a volunteer at Horsham Museum, organiser of the local history group of Horsham Museum Society and Hon. Editor of the local history journal, Horsham Heritage. She wrote or edited a number of books for Horsham Museum and Horsham Museum Society on Thomas Medwin, the Shelley family and their estates, the letters of Bysshe and Timothy Shelley, and the diaries of Sarah Hurst, and a series of booklets on the Horsham Tithe and Enclosure maps. Commercial publications include two photographic books on Horsham for Tempus Publishing in 2001 and 2006; and a book with Horsham Photographic Society called Horsham Through Time for Amberley Publishing, in November 2009. A revised and expanded edition of The Diaries of Sarah Hurst was also published by Amberley in May 2009. Recent publications include Waking the Dead – a guide to Denne Park Cemetery (2010), Keeping House in Horsham in 1760 – the Diary and Account book of Elizabeth Smart (2012), Samuel Evers’ Journal and the story of his life (2013), and a revised edition of George Coomber’s Bygone Corn Mills in the Horsham Area (2014), all published by the Friends of Horsham Museum.

Acknowledgements

FROM THE CURATOR

I would like to thank historian Susan C. Djabri for writing the majority of the text captions. The website would not be, had it not been for her valuable contribution. I would like to thank photographer Edis Jurcys for his splendid photo documentation. Sincere thanks to Amanda Marier for editorial support. I would like to thank David Morrison who was merciful enough to sell me the album. I would like to thank visual artist Matthew Hollett for his design of the website. (I’m so pleased!) Special appreciation is extended to Paul Frecker for his help with attributions. I am also thankful for the insights offered by Erika Togo, Carolyn McCabe, Michelle Brannon, James Pratt and photography professor David K. Brunn. Assistance provided by Noel Chanan in identifying William Lake Price as the photographer of “Lady Craven’s Carriage” was greatly appreciated. I’d like to express my deepest thanks to Dominique Didinal for writing the essay The Old Stagers and to Jenny Thompson for writing the essay On Portraits of Women of the Theatre in The Ricardo Album. Acknowledgement is gratefully made to C. Z. Glass for kind permission to include the leitmotiv for Ray Mead Cottage heard on pages 69, 71 and 77; having originally been a section of Scourge of Positivism. © 2016 C. Z. Glass. All rights reserved.

SPECIAL THANKS

Edmund Stone