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In 1870 Thomas Sutcliffe moved his family to Ewe
Cote approximately a mile from Whitby. Thomas died
in December of 1871 and by the summer of 1872 Frank
is photographing for a client in the Lake District. In
1872–1873 he photographed for Francis Frith a series
of views of Yorkshire’s abbeys and castles. It was from
Frith that he learned to use tracing paper masks to
achieve the proper tonal range in prints. He was also
advised not to include people in the views since the
customer was only interested in the view. During his
work for Frith he makes an image called Sunset after
Rain shot above Rievaulx Abbey. A family friend sent a
copy to John Ruskin who invited Sutcliffe to visit him at
Brantwood in September 1873 where he photographed
Ruskin and the surrounding countryside.
He married Eliza Duck in 1874 and they moved to
Tunbridge Wells in 1875 to establish a photographic
studio. It was a fi nancial failure and he returned to
Whitby in 1876 to establish a studio in Waterloo Yard.
It was a one man operation specializing in portraiture.
On the verso of a carte mount c 1883 he advertised
himself as photographer to Mr. Ruskin, a member of
the Photographic Society of Great Britain and prize
medals in photographic show in 1881 and 1882. In
1894 he moved the studio to 25 Skinner Street, Whitby
where he was able to pursue his portrait work in a state
of the art studio. He became a familiar sight in Whitby
and developed a rapport with the fi shing community. It
was the rather rambunctious children of the fi shermen
who became his water rats. The “Water Rats” is the
most famous of his photographs winning a medal at the
1886 Photographic Society Show in London. From his
return in 1876 until he sold his business in 1922 Sutcliffe
photographed in and around Whitby. His photographs
show an understanding of the people and the commu-
nity of Whitby that is unsurpassed. He began with the
collodion wet plate switched to dry plates and then to
cameras and roll fi lm provided by Kodak.
In 1892 he joined the Linked Ring whose purpose
was to promote photography as an art. He exhibited
at the annual Photographic Salon of the Linked Ring
from 1893–1904. In 1888 he had a one man show at the
Camera Club in London and in 1891 he has a one man
show at the Royal Photographic Society. However, it is
not until 1935 that he is made an Honorary Fellow of
the Royal Photographic Society.
He began writing journal articles in 1875 and went
on to become an editorial contributor to Photography
and between 1895–1913 he regularly wrote for Ama-
teur Photographer and contributed to The Practical
Photographer, The Photogram and Camera Notes. He
also wrote a weekly column “Photography Notes” for
the Yorkshire Weekly Post from 1908–1930. In 1922 he
became curator of the museum of the Whitby Literary
and Philosophical Society and continued in that posi-
tion until March 1941. He died at his home in Sleights
on 31 May 1941.
Paulette E. Barton
Holdings: Royal Photographic Society, Bath;
Sutcliffe Gallery, Whitby, Yorks; George Eastman
House, Rochester, New York; J.P. Getty Museum,
Los Angeles, California; California Museum of
Photography, Riverside, California; Museum of
Contemporary Photography, Chicago Art Institute,
Chicago, Illinois; Boston Museum of Fine Arts,
Boston, Massachusettes; Yale University Art Gallery,
New Haven, Connecticut.
See also: Frith, Francis; Ruskin, John; Wet Collodion
Negative; Camera Design: 6 Kodak (1888–1900);
Brotherhood of the Linked Ring; and Royal
Photographic Society.Further Reading
Armfi eld, Charles N., “Mr. F. M. Sutcliffe,” Sun Artists, no. 8,
July 1891, pp.55–60.
Hankey, J.L., “The Frank M. Sutcliffe Memorial Lecture.” The
Photographic Journal, (August 1942): 280–291.
Hiley, Michael, Frank Sutcliffe Phographer of Whitby, Boston:
David R. Godine, 1974.
———, Frank Meadow Sutcliffe Aperture History of Photography
13, New York: Aperture, 1979.
Shaw, Bill Eglon, “Sutcliffe of Whitby.” Creative Camera (March
1968): 100–103.
———, Frank Meadow Sutcliffe, Photographer, A Selection of
His Work. Whitby: The Sutcliffe Gallery, 1985.
———, Frank Meadow Sutcliffe, A Second Selection. Whitby:
The Sutcliffe Gallery, 1985.
Warren, W.J. “F.M. Sutcliffe of Whitby. An Appreciation and
Some Examples of His Work.” The Amateur Photographer,
(June 15, 1900): 470–473.SUTTON, THOMAS (1819–1875)
English technical writer and photographerThomas Sutton was born in London’s Kensington dis-
trict on 22 September 1819. Very little is known about
his early life. In 1846, he received a Bachelor of Arts
degree from Caius College, Cambridge.
Sutton’s fi rst experience with photography was in
1841, when he posed for a portrait in Antoine Claudet’s
daguerrian portrait studio. At the time he was planning
to continue his education in the direction of art, and
some advice from Claudet made him consider becom-
ing a photographer. A few weeks later, on a holiday in
Jersey, he met an amateur daguerreotypist and started
to pursue photography as a hobby; however, his fi rst
attempts were unsuccessful.
From 1842–50, study at Cambridge and the demands
of married life seem to have prevented him from con-
tinuing with photography.