J.F.W. Herschel; John Frederick William Herschel

Julia Margaret Cameron made four portraits of Sir John Herschel (1792-1871) all from the same sitting which took place at his residence Collingwood, at Hawkhurst in Kent. Herschel was a life long friend, adviser and correspondent to Mrs Cameron. He was an important astronomer who also contributed pioneering improvements to the medium of photography including coining the terms "positive", "negative" and even the word "photography" itself. He also developed the chemical recipe for "hypo", which stops silver salts reacting with light, thereby fixing the image permanently. Herschel was the first to introduce the photographic process to Cameron which she acknowledged in an inscription on one of the portraits: "My great teacher in this art since he used to correspond with me when in India and sent to me all specimens of the advance of the science". The opportunity to take Herschel's portrait was a deeply significant moment which she describes as a point of culmination in Annals of my Glass House (1874):

When I have such men before my camera my whole soul has endeavoured to do its duty towards them in recording faithfully the greatness of the inner as well as the features of the outer man. The photograph thus taken has been almost the embodiment of a prayer. Most devoutly was this feeling present to me when I photographed my illustrious friend, Sir John Herschel. He was to me as a teacher and High Priest. From my earliest girlhood I had loved and honoured him, and it was after a friendship of 31 years duration that the high task of giving his portrait to the nations was allotted to me.

Cameron's biographer Helmut Gernsheim has written that his was 'probably the most striking face she ever had before her lens, displaying the majesty and energy of genius, softened by age'. Cameron sent Herschel, already regarded in his own time as an eminent scientist, mounts which he signed for her, increasing the commercial desirability of the portrait.