A waxed paper calotype negative. A starboard quarter view of the passenger liner Great Britain (1844) dried out alongside the gas work’s Brandon Wharf at Canon’s Marsh, Bristol in the period April – May 1844 before the attempt to get through the inner lock into the Cumberland Basin.

It is not possible to attribute the negative to any individual photographer. Possibilities are William Henry Fox Talbot, the Reverend Calvert Jones or Nicolaas Henneman. Henneman started out as Talbot’s valet but took such an interest in photography that he printed much of Talbot’s work and also took his own photographs. The Reverend Calvert Jones worked independently but had very close ties with Talbot and over the years sold many of his negatives to Talbot so that they could be reproduced commercially