William England 1830–1896
Photographers of Great Britain & Ireland 1840-1940

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Photographic Business
William left the employ of the London Stereoscopic Company c1864. Sometime between 1864 and 1871 he started his own business from his home at 7 St James’s Square, Kensington, London.

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William England was born near Trowbridge, Wiltshire in 1830, the second child and oldest son of John England and Jane England (nee Mizen).

Prior to 1842, before he became a teenager, William began work as a photographic assistant in a daguerreotype studio, learning the art of portraiture as well as the chemical process of treating the light-sensitive silver-coated metal plates to produce an image for sale.

One daguerreotype portrait cost a little more than the average weekly wage, somewhere between 15s and 25s depending on location. This cumbersome technique fell from fashion in the late 1850s as glass plate and wet collodion printing was invented thereby making it possible to produce several copies of one picture; not possible with daguerreotype.

Some time before 1850, William moved to London to further his chosen career in photography.

William joined the London Stereoscopic Company in 1854. William soon proved to be the London Stereoscopic Company’s most talented photographer with his many views that were taken around England, Ireland, France and Switzerland. The demand for stereoscope pictures could barely be met, with thousands being produced by the mid 1850s.

William was commissioned to travel to America in 1859 and again in 1860 to take a series of photographs of the country that so many had heard about but few had seen in pictures. He travelled to the USA for the first time and captured the first American views to be published abroad commercially.

Using a revolutionary shutter which improved the camera’s depth of focus his atmospheric compositions show the stations and locomotives of the Great Western Railway, bridges under construction, river and lake scenes in New York, Montreal and Quebec and above all, the people participating in his scenes.

Perhaps his most famous picture was of Blondin (“The Great Blondin” - a Frenchman born as Jean Francois Gravelet) traversing the gorge below Niagara Falls on a tightrope 335m long and 50m above the water, pole in hands. It became the best-selling stereograph of all time; more than 100,000 cards were sold worldwide. Again in 1860 he went to America to find different perspectives in different seasons and produced wonderful winter scenes of snow and icy landscapes, always with people to give definition...

William died at his home in 7 St. James Square, Nottinghill, Kensington, London on the 13th August 1896. Probate was granted on the 14th January 1897 to William Mayland, gentleman, and Louis William England, photographic printer. His effects totalled £1,138 17s 5d. and he was described as a photographic dry plate manufacturer.

William England left behind a legacy of thousands of glass plate negatives of exquisite images taken in many countries of Europe. They are now in the Hulton Getty collection.