Aerial photograph of Barnard Castle
Price:£7.99
Pioneering photographer provided snapshot of 19th century life
Mar 4, 2008
HE may sound like a character from Dickens, but Elijah Yeoman (pictured right) made a very real impression on the town where he lived and worked a century ago.
Yeoman was born on December 18, 1849, just 10 years after the invention of the process that was to become his livelihood.
He was a pioneering photographer, and it is largely thanks to his work that we know so much about how people and places in Teesdale looked around the turn of the last century.
Yeoman was a native of Arkleside, in Coverdale, North Yorkshire, the son of a farmer.
It is not clear how he got started in what would have been a very new and high-tech science, although his older brother, John, was also a photographer, in Bedale.
It appears that Yeoman started work with his brother's business, before moving to Barnard Castle, although it is unclear exactly when he made the move.
A lot of his early work has the mark "founded 1864" on the reverse, but this could refer to the start date of another Barnard Castle photograper.
There is an indication that Yeoman took over an already-established business, that of JT Bainbridge - one of his early portraits sates ‘Successor to JT Bainbridge'.
Yeoman is listed in the 1881 census as a ‘Photographic Artist' living in Barnard Castle. Records show that Bainbridge was based at The Bank in 1865, and at 13 Galgate in 1873 and 1879.
Yeoman married Honor Varder at Haberton, in Devon, on April 22, 1880, and he was listed on the marriage register as a photographer.
It appears that Yeoman and his new wife began their married life in Marshall Street, where their three daughters were born. They then moved to 13 Galgate sometime between 1885 and 1883 and their son was born at this address.
No 13 Galgate is where Addisons the surveyors and estate agents are based today and it would have been a prime spot for a business. With the arrival of the railways, Barnard Castle was becoming popular with day-trippers and Yeoman would have been able to target tourists as they arrived in the town centre.
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| Yeoman pictured the visit of Princess Eugenie, of Battenburg, to Raby Castle in October 1905 |
Yeoman's era was a time of great technological change for photography. In the 1870s, virtually the only people dabbling in the art would be professionals, because the processing technique was so complex.
The wet-plate process used in those early years of photography, involved flowing a solution of solvents over a glass plate immediately before exposure.
When indoor shots were taken, photographers of the time would use flash powder, essentially a pyrotechnic, that would create a large flash of light,
In stark contrast to today's digital world, where photographers can take many hundreds of pictures in one go, and pick the best, Yeoman would generally need to get it right first time.
This makes the quality of his work all the more remarkable.
Unfortunately, Yeoman's negatives have not survived, but the Bowes Museum, in Barnard Castle, has a large collection of his pictures.
They have picked many of these up from collectors over the years, but a large number come from 12 albums that would, it is thought, have originally been placed on the counter of Yeoman's Galgate shop to show potential clients examples of his work.
The pictures were part of a collection from the Revd W Oliver, of Rokeby, a noted local historian.
Yeoman captured much of the Teesdale scenery on plate and film, including iconic landmarks such as High Force and Egglestone Abbey.
His main source of income would have been by taking photographs of people for visiting and cabinet cards, but he was also a landscape photographer taking photographs of the landscape, towns and villages in Teesdale and Cumbria.
Yeoman also liked to include people in his landscapes and these pictures are considered "classic Yeoman".
One of his photographs which has survived is of King Edward VII being driven through Barnard Castle after a shooting party in the surrounding countryside.
Kelly's Directory for 1914 lists Arnold S Sweeten as the photographer at 13 Galgate.
By this point, Yeoman and his wife had retired to the village of Sockbridge, near Penrith, in Cumberland.
Honor died on November 16, 1924 and Elijah died on March 1, 1930.
Yeoman left behind a legacy that has delighted historians ever since.
A collection of his work has just gone on display at The Bowes Museum in an exhibition titled "Moments Caught in Time - Two Centuries of Life Through the Lens", which will run until June 15.
Sources: North East Museums Libraries and Archives Council and The Bowes Museum.
First published in the Mercury, February 27, 2008