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Photography had already had a signifi cant effect on
the creation of illustrations to printed publication on the
Crystal Palace prior to the publication of the Report by
the Juries. John Tallis had used Daguerreotypes taken by
E. Fehrenbach, Richard Beard, W.E. Kilburn and J.J.E.
Mayall to create steel engravings for the illustrations for
Tallis’s History and Description of the Crystal Palace
(3 vols.) John Tallis, London and New York [1852].
In June 1851 photographs by Philip Henry Delamotte
(1820–1889) of the exhibition building in its different
stages—and of pieces of the sculpture to be exhibited
were displayed at a conversazione of the Society of
Arts in London. However, Delamotte’s images were not
used to illustrate the Reports by the Juries. This honour
was bestowed on probably three photographers. Some
forty-three of the photographs can be accredited to the
Frenchman Claude-Marie Ferrier (1811–1889) while a
further twenty-eight can be attributed to Hugh Owen
(1808–1897), an amateur photographer and the Chief
Cashier of the Great Western Railway. Owen worked
with paper negatives, Ferrier with glass, using Niépce
de St Victor’s albumen process. The France-domiciled
English photographer Robert Bingham printed the
photographs used for the illustrations.
The idea of producing photographically illustrated
presentation sets of the jury reports probably came
from Prince Albert. Henry Cole noted in his diary
in July 1851 that the “Prince [Albert] suggested that
Talbotypes should be prepared to illustrate the report
of the Jurors, and that 100 copies should be taken of
each negative to be distributed to Public Libraries and
foreign countries exhibiting.” Subsequently, the Royal
Commissioners decided at their meeting of 26 July
1851 to reserve £1,000 for “Photographs of Articles
exhibited, to be preserved as permanent memorials of
the Exhibition.” At their next meeting, in August 1851,
they formulated a letter to all foreign committees in
which they mentioned the proposal of “transmitting to
the Governments of their respective countries, through
the Foreign-offi ce, a complete set of the Medals and a
copy of the Reports of the juries, illustrated by photo-
graphs of articles exhibited, in commemoration of the
part taken by them in securing a representation at the
Exhibition of the produce of their National Industries.”
The complete presentation set was to consist of the four
mentioned volumes of the jury reports, three volumes
of the Offi cial Descriptive and Illustrated Catalogue
(illustrated with engravings) and one volume of the
First (and Second) Report of The Commissioners for
the Exhibition of 1851.
By November 1851, William Henry Fox Talbot noted
he had agreed with the Executive Committee, respon-
sible for the production of the Reports by the Juries, that
he would receive 15 copies of the presentation copies,
of a value “roughly estimated at £30 per copy” in com-pensation for the printing not being contracted to Talbot
and his former manservant, Nicolaas Henneman, who
had set up a photographic establishment in London in- Henneman was to be given “a present of £200 to
compensate him for his trouble and disappointment.” A
list of 122 governments and institutions and individuals
who were to receive complimentary copies was agreed
and recorded in the minutes of the 52nd meeting of the
Royal Commissioners in March 1852.
The production of the photographically illustrated
copies of Reports by the Juries represented a monu-
mental logistical challenge the like of which had not
been previously attempted. Over 20,000 photographs
would need to be individually printed at an average
of 80 per day—using daylight—and then mounted.
In the event, many of the photographs were printed in
Versailles, where Robert Bingham had set up a print-
ing establishment for this purpose. Bingham had the
negatives on loan from the Royal Commission. When
the project was fi nished in 1853, he was obliged to
send them back to England because the time allowed
by the French customs to keep them in France had
expired. Captain Henry Charles Cunliffe Owen of the
Royal Engineers was a key player in the organisation
of the production of the presentation copies and in
April 1852 he contacted the British Museum to advise
on the mounting of the photographs on paper supports.
According to Edgar Bowring, secretary of the Royal
Commission, Captain Owen did not contend himself
with any inferior execution and workmanship and was
therefore largely responsible for the excellent condition
of the presentation copies which made them a “hand-
some & highly fi nished present.”
From the illustrations lists, printed in the volumes, it
can be derived that jury reports were intended to have
154 photographs. However, the number of images in
individual copies varies. A survey of the subject matter
of the photographs in the Reports is revealing. Over fi fty
are of free-standing pieces of sculpture exhibited within
the Crystal Palace thus giving a disproportionate perspec-
tive, considering the thirty classes of the exhibits and the
exhibition’s overall character. However, sculpture fi gured
prominently in the exhibition, being placed at eye-catch-
ing spots in the Crystal Palace. These objects, like August
Kiss’ Amazon and Hiram Powers’ Greek Slave, proved
to be very popular with the public and were given much
attention in other publications. Sculpture also made good
subjects for the photographers who could show off their
ability with interesting compositions and dramatic light-
ening. There are around ten general views of the building
and the remainder of photographs document individual
exhibits, including a view of Prince Albert’s model house
for families—subsequently rebuilt in Kennington, south
London. In the process, the Royal Engineers were given
the task of gaining permission from the exhibitors to
EXHIBITION OF THE WORKS OF INDUSTRY
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