Crouch, Henry | Cambridge? | Tailboard | Half Plate
TAILBOARD FIELD CAMERA | 1891. Working from various addresses, Henry Crouch was definitely at the address on this camera, 66, Barbican, London EC. in 1891. By 1892 he also had premises at 141, Oxford Street, London. This is in the fashionable heart of the city, and was presumably his retail premises. The firm was not seen advertising after 1898, when it is assumed they had ceased trading. Crouch was a maker as well as a retailer; this camera bears his nameplate, flush-inlaid and screwed in place, rather than laid on in the usual style of retail plates, so I am claiming this as a Crouch-made camera, although I am aware that Gandolfi were producing similar (but not identical) cameras for the trade in London at the same time. I have found nothing in the literature or on the camera itself to support the identification of this Spanish mahogany, fine dovetailed camera as a "Cambridge", but the case has the word "Cambridge" professionally and apparently originally, lettered on the side of it.
Extra photographs, where available: Click on thumbnail to open in a new page.
