Derbyshire Photographers Profiles : Henry Morton of Chesterfield
Derbyshire Photographers' Profiles
by Brett Payne, of Tauranga, New Zealand
Henry Morton

of Burlington Street, Chesterfield




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Henry Morton was born in about 1825 in Sheffield, Yorkshire.  He married Sarah Arnott (born c. 1818 at Chesham in Buckinghamshire) at Lewisham (London) in 1853.  They apparently had no children.

Henry Morton worked as an itinerant photographer in the early 1850s before settling in Chesterfield.  In May 1854, a Mr H. Morton was making photographic portraits in Leeds, but by July 1854, he was working from a studio in Burlington Street, Chesterfield [Derbyshire Courier, 1st July 1854, p2, col.6].  However, the 1855 Post Office Directory for Chesterfield lists him thus: "cutler, & agent to the Safety life office, Burlington street."  White's 1857 trade directory shows Henry Morton of Burlington street practising as a "cutlery & hardware dealer and jeweller", and in 1860 (Harrison) he was listed as a "cutler, bookseller and stationer."  The census record for 7 April 1861 shows him once again as a "stationer & cutler."  Photography was obviously a part-time occupation.

In February 1861, Henry Morton of Chesterfield exhibited "10 photographs 10 ins x 8 ins  at 3/- each and 40 photographs 12 ins x 10 ins at 4/- each" at the Photographic Society of Scotland.  In December that year, Henry Morton of Chesterfield submitted "12 landscapes of Derbyshire" to the 6th Exhibition organised by the Photographic Society of Scotland. [5th Exhibition of PSS, Feb, 1861 & 6th Exhibition of PSS, Dec, 1861 - as featured on Peter Stubbs' EdinPhoto Website - The History of Photography in Edinburgh]


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References
Images kindly provided by 
1861 Census of Derbyshire - publ. on CD-ROM by ArchiveCD Books
Anon (1855) The Post Office Directory of Derbyshire & Nottingamshire,  University of Leicester's Digital Library of Historical Directories
White, F. & Co. (1857) History, Gazetteer & Directory of the County of Derby, Neil Wilson's Full Transcript
Anon (1860) Harrison, Harrod, and Co.'s Directory and Gazetteer of Derbyshire, London.
FreeBMD
Heathcote, Bernard & Pauline (2002) A Faithful Likeness - The First Photographic Portrait Studios in the British Isles, 1841 to 1855, publ. by the authors, 27 Plough Lane, Lowdham, Nottinghamshire, NG14 7AT, England, Courtesy of David Simkin.

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