1087
secretary of the Royal Institution. After January 1860,
the journal was edited jointly by Thomas Piper and
George Wharton-Simpson. Simpson remained as editor
until his sudden death in 1880, having also become sole
proprietor of the journal in 1860. It was under Simpson’s
imprimatur that the Photographic News was the lead-
ing photographic journal. Simpson provided excellent
reports of international developments in photography
and introduced many contributors who subsequently be-
came well-known photographic fi gures. These included
Henry Peach Robinson, A.W. Vogel and Colonel Stuart
Wortley. After Simpson’s death, the journal was taken
over by H. Baden Pritchard, the head of the photographic
department at the Royal Arsenal, Woolwich. Pritchard
introduced the illustration of photographs and the Pho-
tographic News is a signifi cant historical record of early
forms of photomechanical reproduction.
The Photographic News was at its most infl uential
from the late 1850s to the mid 1880s. During this period,
its readership was predominantly made up of profes-
sional photographers. It was the increasing ease with
which photography could be carried out, combined with
the corresponding increase in the number of amateurs,
which meant the alteration and subsequent slow decline
of the Photographic News. In 1884, Pritchard died
and Thomas Bolas became editor. In 1891, Pritchard’s
widow sold the journal to T.C. Hepworth, who attempted
to make the journal much more attractive to amateur
photographers. In 1892, it changed proprietors for the
fi nal time and reformatted itself as primarily a paper for
amateurs. Trade gossip gave way to a weekly competi-
tions and pictorial analysis. Subsequent editors were E.J.
Wall (1897–1902), Richard Penlake (1902–1906) and
F.J. Mortimer (1906–1908). The journal fi nally ceased
publication in 1908 when it was amalgamated with the
Amateur Photographer.
John Plunkett
See also: British Journal of Photography; Robinson,
Henry Peach; Vogel, Hermann Wilhelm; and
Pritchard, Henry Baden.
Further Reading
Seiberling, Grace, and Carolyn Bloore, Amateurs, photography
and the mid-Victorian imagination, Chicago: Chicago UP &
International Museum of Photography, 1986.
“Fifty Years of the Photographic News,” Photographic News 8
May 1908: 446–447.
“Introductory Address,” Photographic News 10 September
1858: 1.
“Preface,” Photographic News 2 September 1859: 4.
PHOTOGRAPHIC NOTES (1956–1867)
Edited by Thomas Sutton (1819–1875) the ‘inde-
fatigable experimenter and journalist’ (British Journal
Photographic Almanac 1876, 22) Photographic Notes
appeared on 1 January 1856 and ceased publication in
1867 when it merged in February into The Illustrated
Photographer which started publication that same
month. During the early part of its life it was associated
with Blanquart-Evrard who wrote occasionally for it,
and with whom Sutton worked, and it became the house
journal for the Manchester Photographic Society, Pho-
tographic Society of Scotland and Birmingham Photo-
graphic Society. The editorial content of Photographic
Notes refl ected the preferences and prejudices of its
editor and Sutton was not afraid to voice opinions that
other contemporary publications would not—notably
against the Photographic Society of London.
The fi rst numbers of Photographic Notes appeared
in January and February 1856, published in Jersey by
Sutton and Blanquart-Evrard from St Brelade’s Bay,
Jersey where Sutton was resident and ran his own pho-
tographic printing works. The publication was more
successful than Sutton had anticipated, for a second
edition of these numbers was published on 1 May 1856
in a ‘remodelled’ form ‘suppressing two or three articles
of minor importance.’ A third edition was also published
of numbers 1 to 4. Throughout the earlier period of
the journal, revised or combined editions of particular
numbers were issued.
Sutton described the journal as being ready to report
the proceedings of photographic societies in the United
Kingdom; to include notices of matters relating either
to the theory or practice of photography; at the service
of the professional and amateur photographer; to in-
clude extracts from foreign journals; and leaders that
will contain a resume of the photographic views and
a discussion of the photographic topics of the day. He
concluded ‘in offering our own opinions, we wish it to
be understood that we invite discussion’.
In issue 5 of 25 April 1856 Sutton reported that Pho-
tographic Notes had ‘obtained a circulation more than
half that of the Journal of the Parent [the Photographic
of London] Society.’ The May issue reported that it
had been adopted as the journal of the Photographic
Society of Scotland and in June that the Manchester
Photographic Society had adopted it. The Birmingham
Photographic Society adopted the journal from early- Monthly publication was stopped in favour of
fortnightly publication on the 1st and 15th of the month
from 1 September 1856. With issue 13 of 15 October
Sutton reported that circulation had ‘received a sudden
increase’ and that numbers 3 and 11 were out of print
and that 4 and 12 nearly so. He would be reprinting back
numbers and increasing the print run.
Sutton did not include material already published in
other British photographic journals, principally the Liv-
erpool Photographic Journal (later the British Journal
of Photography) and the Journal of the Photographic