Erased Family Daguerreotype

Quarter-plate daguerreotype in pressed leather case / c. 1850s

Quarter-plate daguerreotype, c. 1850s of a family…with a ghost. I handle a hundred objects a day, but some things haunt me, and this is one of them. The sitter to the left in this portrait has apparently been deliberately erased. His spectral visage remains beneath the scratches however, with the eerie three-dimensional quality of many such early images, as if inhabiting the interior of the silver plate. Why was he scratched from the picture? I wonder if the man removed himself. Perhaps he was of dishonest character and vanished, abandoning his wife and child. She opened the elaborately tooled leather case, peeled back the gilt frame, removed the glass with care, and with a wet handkerchief tried to make his memory disappear. We’ll never know the true story behind this 150 year old photograph, but its ghost lives on within.

Very good antique condition…with a third of the photograph erased.

Measurements

4.5 inches tall
3.75 inches wide

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