Notes: Mayall was a Philadelphian who operated a studio in
that city until he moved permanently to London in the late 1840’s. Mayall
exhibited at the London Fair in 1851. His success as a portraitist to the upper
echelons of British society won him an invitation to take carte de visite portraits
of Queen Victoria and the royal family. He subsequently made a considerable
fortune mass-marketing these portraits. (Source: Craig’s Daguerreian
Registry, vol. 3, p. 386.)
This portrait can be identified as a Mayall by the distinctive inlaid, octagonal
table, which he employed as a studio prop. Mayall used this table in a portrait
of Albert Sands Southworth, the partner of Josiah Johnsohn Hawes, who together
operated the famed Southworth and Hawes photography studio in Boston, MA. That
image may be seen in Sotheby’s April 27, 1999 auction catalogue, “The
David Feigenbaum Collection of Southworth & Hawes and Other 19th-Century
Photographs,” Sale 7295 (New York: Sotheby’s, 1999), p. 46.
