Figure 1.--This cabinet card portrait shows a mother with two children. One is an infant about 1 year old. who could be a boy or girl. The older child certainly looks like a boy who seems to be about 10 years old. We are not at all sure what he is wearing. It could be a dress, but a smock or tunic is also possible. We are just not sure. While it looks like a dress, it would be unusual for a 10-year old to be wearing a dress, but we can not see any pants and at the time both knee pants and knicker were worn below the knee. It is a collared garment, but we notice a ruff at the collar and matching wrist treatment. We see front pleats, but no buttons, a very low waist, and a side sash done in the same material as the garment itself. We can not see any garment underneath. We do note dark long stockings. Props are often helpful in identifying gender. The boy is holding something, but we do not know what itis. The studio is R. Hammond in Bacup. This is a town in norhcentral England. It is the South Pennines area of Lancanshire close to the boundary with West Yorkshire.

This cabinet card portrait shows a mother with two children. One is an infant about 1 year old. who could be a boy or girl. The older child certainly looks like a boy who seems to be about 10 years old. We are not at all sure what he is wearing. It could be a dress, but a smock or tunic is also possible. We are just not sure. While it looks like a dress, it would be unusual for a 10-year old to be wearing a dress, but we can not see any pants and at the time both knee pants and knicker were worn below the knee. It is a collared garment, but we notice a ruff at the collar and matching wrist treatment. The collar seems to be more like a boy's collar thn a girl's dress collar. We see front pleats, but no buttons, a very low waist, and a side sash done in the same material as the garment itself. We can not see any garment underneath. We do note dark long stockings. Props are often helpful in identifying gender. The boy is holding something, but we do not know what it is. The portrait is a little difficult to date becuse there is no backdrop and we can not see theany furniture. We would guess that it was taken in the 1870s. The studio is R. Hammond in Bacup. This is a town in norhcentral England. It is the South Pennines area of Lancanshire close to the boundary with West Yorkshire.

Created: 11:19 AM 9/12/2017
Last updated: 11:19 AM 9/12/2017