Henry Collen - Photocopier

Photocopier

In the late 1970s, Larry Schaaf wrote about the contributions of Henry Collen to the field of photography in its early stages in London in the 19th century. Schaaf's premise was that Collen's work was indeed noteworthy, and had perhaps been overshadowed by the earlier work of William Henry Fox Talbot in the same field. The information on the following pages comes from Mr. Schaaf's article titled, "Henry Collen and the Treaty of Nanking," which appeared in The History of Photography, an international quarterly, October 1982.

The Treaty of Nanking was signed on 29 August 1842. The treaty signaled the end of the "Opium Wars" between China and England. It also ceded the island of Hong Kong to England and was of great commercial and psychological importance to the British Empire. Photography was in its infancy. Daguerre's method had the "ability to record the fine detail" but would have supplied "only a small metal plate as a facsimile of the rice paper." Talbot's process was far more suitable for copying the original treaty, and so authorities turned to the first man licensed to practice in London" and the man who had the know-how to make the photographic copy of the 4-foot-long (1.2 m) treaty.(Schaaf)

Schaaf states, "Henry Collen was in the unique position of both owning the patent rights and of having access to the circles of power. As miniature-painter to the Queen, he would have been in a position to discuss such a project with the proper people..."

The treaty consists of 22 pages handwritten in English in ink and sixteen sheets of Chinese characters. On Christmas Day, Collen produced at least two copies of the 4-foot-long (1.2 m) document. "Copying a four foot -long document with delicate lettering out to the edges would be quite difficult, especially in 1842" (Schaaf). He goes on to state that he thinks Collen merits a great deal more study than he had been given to that date.

Since Larry Schaaf wrote his 1982 article about the Treaty of Nanking, R. Derek Wood has written another article titled "Photocopying the Treaty of Nanking in January 1843." In it, Wood includes new information about the number of copies produced by Henry Collen and their whereabouts. It seems that the original treaty was brought to London for the Queen's signature after Collen made the copy. At the last minute, it was decided that an extra copy should be made to hang at Buckingham Palace, which is why Collen was working on it on Christmas Day. Wood believes that three copies were made in all. The copy that hung at the palace is thought to have been discarded but there is a copy at the International Museum of Photography and Film at the George Eastman House in Rochester, NY. It is in book form and is bound in leather. (see photo) Mr. Wood's article deciphers the long journey of this copy and the location of the original Chinese document. Collen's copies were taken to China, but by 1877 the original could not be located. It seems that when in the very last few days of June in 1997, as Hong Kong was passed back to the People's Republic of China, a(n)....announcement was made to reveal that Chiang Kai-shek's Chinese Nationalist forces had secretly taken the original Treaty of Nanking when they retreated to Taiwan from China in 1949. And the documents have been hidden in a sealed vault of the Taiwan Foreign Ministry. (Wood)

Meanwhile, in 1952, the George Eastman House was offered for purchase one of Henry Collen's copies from a dealer of rare books in California. It was unknown how this dealer had obtained this copy. It is Wood's contention that this copy was brought to California by a member of Chiang Kai-shek's forces who fled from Taiwan to California just before February, 1952.

Wood's article also includes copies of bills financial costs and copies of the treat (included in Appendix).

At any rate, even after such seemingly important strides in the infant field of photography, Henry Collen still had unsurmountable hurdles to face in his attempts to make photography a financially viable profession. The problem, in part, was due to the nature of his relationship to Talbot.

The relationship between Henry Collen and Henry Talbot seems quite complex. They were probably good friends. Talbot originated the calotype process and licensed Collen to practice it. Henry paid Talbot a fair share of his profits. Collen worked to perfect the process and invested considerable time and energy into this work. He wanted patent protection rights from Talbot because of this. Talbot stalled in this area. As mentioned earlier, Talbot had the scientific knowledge and Collen the artistic, but for some reason, Talbot did not pursue the business possibilities attendant to the caloytype process. When Collen was asked to photograph the Treaty of Nanking, Talbot's wife later lamented about why Talbot himself hadn't done the job "for her Majesty." (Schaaf).

Schaaf also states that Talbot for some reason did not share all of his expertise with Collen, and at some point Henry's lack of scientific know-how limited his ability to experiment further. Henry Collen had taken over one thousand calotype portraits but had received payment for only 265 of them. It was not profitable for Collen or Talbot to continue. He ended his calotype business in 1844 and retired to St. Albans in 1861. He had photographed some of the most important people of his day and his photographic work was respected enough to hang in Buckingham Palace.

The largest collections of his photographic works are in the George Eastman House in Rochester, N.Y. and The Science Museum in London as well as the Fox Talbot Museum and the Royal Photographic Society.

In spite of an unfortunately shortened photographic career, Henry Collen is mentioned and published in various journals of photography and science (see appendix).