Portfolio Cover: THE SCENERY of the BROADS AND RIVERS of NORFOLK & SUFFOLK, 24 PHOTO ENGRAVINGS by G. Christopher Davies – Price One Guinea, Jarrold & Sons 3, Paternoster Buildings, London; And London Street, Norwich.

The first and second series, both published in 1883, were issued in editions of 25 copies on India paper and 250 copies on etching paper. The photogravure plates were printed by T. & R. Annan of Glasgow. PhotoSeed holds incomplete copies of both series, with our second series containing 18 of the 24 plates printed on etching paper.

Photographing the Norfolk Broads and Rivers

Aboard the Coya, a four-ton yacht, skipper George Christopher Davies describes his methods of photography for his 1883 volume Norfolk Broads and Rivers: Or, The Water-ways, Lagoons, and Decoys of East Anglia. This voyage is believed to have taken place in 1882, with a selection of these views (48) published as photogravures in the first and second series folios:

“And now we became subject to the slavery of the photographic-box. Whenever we saw a picturesque drainage windmill, a cottage in a group of trees, ancient ruins, yachts or wherries, making a pretty picture, “Oh, we must have that!” and the yacht was run up to the bank. The mate would drag forth the big box and deposit it on the skipper’s toes, and the skipper would trip up the mate with the tripod. Then the mate would do the focussing and exposing, while the skipper “shoo’d” off the too curious bullocks and cows, or dispensed valuable advice. We used the dry-plate process of course, and had the plates developed when we got home. We over-exposed most of them, for it seemed impossible that a second’s exposure should suffice; and the skipper constantly urged, when not engaged with the cows, “Give it another second to make sure.” Still we obtained a great number of excellent pictures, well worth all the tides and winds we lost through the constantly recurring delays.” (pp. 38-39)

With several exceptions noted, we do not know the exact pagination of the folio plates for both series, however, Christian White Rare Books has described some of the geographical sequencing from a previous sale of both series:

This sequence follows the route of the Wensum out of Norwich via Thorpe and then onto the Yare at Whitlingham, Postwick, Surlingham, Buckingham Ferry with a little group of images around Wroxham and Salhouse rounding out the set.

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The following background on the first and second series folios is courtesy Photogravure.com, cited from secondary sources:

Christopher Davies, a prolific writer of guide books to East Anglia, illustrated this work from his own photographs, which were printed in the photogravure process by T. & R. Annan. This work predates the published books of P.H. Emerson. Initially, in 1883, Jarrold and Sons, published by subscription the first portfolio of 24 photogravure plates with text by Davies in an edition of 25 sets on India paper, and 250 sets on etching paper. Soon after, a second series was issued with the same title and edition size. What can be assumed is that sales of the 2 separate portfolios were weak, given the scarcity of extant copies and that Jarrold & Sons issued the complete 48 plates bound together in 1889. (1.)

Davies was a gifted amateur and the first to photograph the Broads extensively. His work predated Peter Henry Emerson by a few years and some say prefigured it. He worked with a small 4” x 6” camera with dry plates which could be processed long after the exposure in the camera. His first book of photographs of the Broads was published in 1883 and included 12 photogravures that are different than the ones in this set. James Craig Annan, Thomas Annan’s son traveled to Vienna to study photogravure with the inventor Karl Klic in 1883. The gravures done for Davies would be some of the earliest by the firm. Davies’ biographer, Cliff Middleton, states that he believes that the Annan’s added clouds to the photographs, but in examining all 48 published in “The man who found the Broads,” none of the cloudscapes are duplicated. (2.)

1. As stated on p. 40 in the biography of Davies: Campbell, Jamie & Cliff Middleton.[Scenery Broads Rivers Norfolk Suffolk] Middleton C, The Broadland Photographers : The Photographs of J. Payne Jennings P. H. Emerson and George Christopher Davies. Norwich England: Wensum Books; 1978.
2. Hanson, David A. The David A. Hanson Collection of the History of Photomechanical Printing. The Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute. Catalog 2000