Journal

demonstration in London of the process took place the following month on
11 September. The excessively long exposure made sitting extremely
uncomfortable, so it was not surprising that most early Daguerreotype
subjects were static such as buildings and landscapes. The early 1840s,
however, saw rapid technical improvements and by the mid 1850s, exposure
time had been reduced, and the price of a Daguerreotype portrait had fallen
from one guinea to just 1s.6d. Meanwhile William Henry Fox Talbot was
experimenting with another type of photography, the calotype which was
eventually to supplant the Daguerreotype and become the prototype of
modern photography as it used negatives and allowed copies to be made.
Richard Beard opened the first Daguerreotype portrait studio in Regent Street
in March 1841 and was the sole patentee in England and Wales until 1853.
Until then, prospective British photographers had to purchase a licence from
Beard for a considerable sum. By 1855 there were 66 photographic
establishments in England and his figure had almost doubled by 1857.
Some early photographers were itinerant, including Edward Holland who
practised for a short period in Yorkshire in 1843. Many photographers were
women. The most famous were Eliza Constable who had a studio in Brighton,
and Lady Frances Elizabeth Jocelyn, a train-bearer at Queen Victoria’s wedding,
whose studio was near Hastings. Her most famous work was the 1858 photo
of a family group on the steps of Lord Palmerson’s house.
Doubtless the Daguerreotype photograph had an impact on portrait artists
from the early 1840s onwards, but Branwell had abandoned his career early in
1839, about the same time the French government purchased the patent. He
had already returned to Hawarth several months before the process was
made public and a year before Richard Beard established the first
Daguerreotype studio24 in England. In 1855 when the Bradford-born
photographer, William Barret established photographic studios in York and
Durham followed by William Chatterton in Bradford a year later, Branwell
Brontë had been dead over seven years. To say, therefore, that the advent of
the Daguerreotype process was a reason for Branwell’s abandonment of his
career in portraiture is in any event premature.
Branwell’s tutorship with the Postlethwaites of Ulverston was followed by a
position as a railway clerk at Sowerby Bridge and Luddenden Foot until
March, 1842 and then in 1843 by his disastrous appointment as tutor at
Thorp Green with the Robinson family which ended abruptly in July, 1845. It
ontë, The Old Hall, Thorp
e he tutored 1843-1845
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