William Thompson – The World's First Underwater Photographer

by Nick Baker

Reproduced from Historical Diving Times Issue 19 (Summer 1997)

The Editor wishes to thank all those who have helped in the compilation of this article including: Ian Ross, Brian Cooper, John Neuschwander and  Steven Weinberg.

He also wishes to extend his deepest sympathy to the family of Mrs Rosemary Thompson, who provided the photographs by William Thompson without which the article would have been incomplete.

Mrs Thompson sadly passed away in June. She was the wife of the late Brigadier Thompson, direct descendant of William. She was most enthusiastic about the plaque project and had planned to travel to Weymouth to see it unveiled.

'The world's first' is a phrase often misapplied, especially with regard to aspects of technology. Frequently a technological 'first' is simply the most noticeable or publicized occurrence in a series of interconnected or parallel developments. However, the world's first underwater photograph is not one of these. It stands instead as a seminal event; a single effort made in spite of the primitive technology of its time.

Indeed, so revolutionary was the photograph that by the time that Emile Boutan, with all the advantages of half a century of development and knowledge, came to take his underwater snapshots at the turn of the century, this previous effort had all but been forgotten. So much so that authorities on underwater history have been known to ascribed the Frenchman as having been 'the first'. They are wrong. The man responsible for the first ever underwater photograph was William Thompson (1822-1879), an Englishman, and a Gentleman, of Weymouth in Dorset.

Thompson was born in 1822, eldest son of a wealthy family. Educated in England and France, he was steeped at an early age in an appreciation of the countryside, and through this the structure and workings of the natural world.

Although he studied and qualified as a solicitor, William Thompson was first and foremost a naturalist in the heroic amateur tradition. The mid-Victorian period in England was an age where wealth allied with leisure could afford an intelligent man a most pleasurable life of enquiry and discovery according to his whim. There was, after all, much to be discovered. Thompson was both wealthy and intelligent, and throughout his life he vociferously and whimsically pursued knowledge of all kinds.

In 1847 he married Sarah Slade, the daughter of a wealthy merchant family. The couple moved into No.11 Frederick Place, Weymouth. The house still stands, a Georgian style bow-fronted building, now a busy GP practice, and soon to be the site of an HDS plaque commemorating Thompson and his achievement.

Living so close to the seashore, Thompson's interest was soon attracted to the marine flora and fauna around Weymouth Bay. Owner of two substantial boats, a 104 ton yawl the 'Waif' and 12 ton cutter 'Feather Star', he began trawling and dredging for specimens. He rapidly became an expert on anemones and seaweed, discovering several new species.

A measure of Thompson's ability was the respect he was accorded by the greatest of Victorian aquarists, William Gosse. They met on several occasions, and Gosse acknowledged Thompson in a number of his writings on marine life, including his classic work, 'The Aquarium, an unveiling of the Wonders of the Deep Sea', published in 1854.

One of Thompson's experiments is particularly worthy of attention. It concerned the seaweed known as Peacocks Tail. According to Gosse, Thompson transplanted fronds of the weed from "their native area" to "similar situations" in other parts of Weymouth Bay. By this means the rocks beneath Sandsfoot Castle, Byng Cliff and the Nothe were populated with Peacocks Tail, where before it had been absent. Modern day students of marine biology take note: the underwater environment may not be as 'natural' as you think!

In addition to his marine studies Thompson was an acknowledged expert on molluscs, and also made important ornithological observations. He was an active member of the British Archaeological Association, and a Town Councillor and Alderman. Meanwhile, in his spare time he hunted, raced greyhounds and built up a private museum! Indeed in 1879, after an altercation with his Council colleagues concerning the time taken up by his outside interests, he tendered his resignation.

William Thompson died later the same year aged 55, fairly young by our late 20th century standards but an average age in Victorian England. He was buried in the family grave at Wyke Regis where he lies with his wife, father and other family members. The monument, a large imposing somewhat confused neo-gothic structure, has survived a churchyard clearance, and stands fairly isolated in one of the church's three separate burial grounds. The Thompson family arms are clearly visible in marble above slightly more worn panels of Portland stone which list the occupants. However, with a little care William Thompson's name can be made out.

SKETCHING WITH LIGHT

In the mid-19th century the principal task of the naturalist was to record, and the ability to sketch specimens was seen as an essential skill. Unfortunately Thompson, by his own admission, "could not use a pencil". He was thus attracted to the possibilities of the photographic image almost as soon as it became generally available. By the early 1850s he owned a number of cameras and had enthusiastically embraced the new art (and science) of photography as an aid to his study of natural history.

How his idea for an underwater photograph came about, sometime during the winter of 1855-56, and the experiment that followed, is delightfully recorded in Thompson's paper 'On Taking Photographic Images Under Water', published in the Journal of The Society Of Arts, May 9th, 1856. The photograph itself was taken in February.

That this paper was written at all is due to the efforts of Thompson's friend William Penny of Pool. Penny, himself a chemist and naturalist, informed the Journal of Thompson's activities and he was thereby persuaded to submit an account of his experiment. Had Penny not done so it is doubtful whether the busy Thompson would have written anything down, and the exact details of this historic underwater achievement would have gone unrecorded.

The paper, which is by far the best means of describing Thompson's inspirational achievement, is reproduced here in full. It is not without a certain dry humour (modern scientific writers take note!), whilst Thompson's own character emerges from the page as being distinctly 'laid back'. A camera flooded with salt water would have been something of a disaster, even to a wealthy gentleman of the 1850s, and William's concern for the image rather than the hardware is to be admired.

Perhaps best of all is Thompson's slight but significant allusion to the exact moment and circumstance of his idea's conception. In the first few paragraphs he describes how, whilst " weather-bound, and two miles from home and dinner", in the Portland Ferry Bridge House he "was musing" on the force of water against the piles of the nearby bridge and thought of how the camera might "considerably assist" in assessing potential damage. Thus, not only do we know exactly where Thompson was when the idea came to him, but that this place, in the finest English tradition, was a public house. Indeed the building, now called the Ferry Bridge Inn, still stands, and although much altered from William Thompson's day portions of the original structure still remain. The bridge meanwhile has undergone several rebuilds, and the slipway beneath the latest version is much used for the launch of small boats by amateur divers, many of them on their way to take underwater photographs in Weymouth bay.

WET PLATES AND ENTHUSIASM

Taking any photograph, let alone an underwater one, by the collodion method in 1856 was something of an achievement, and a brief resume of early photographic procedures is probably the most effective way of illustrating just how revolutionary Thompson's underwater photograhic experiment really was.

Early Days

The idea of capturing natural images in a permanent way had been around for hundreds of years. However it wasn't until the late 1820s that this was actually achieved. In 1826 a Frenchman, Nicephre Niepce, produced the first successful photographic image, although the exposure took several hours. During the 1830s Niepce's partner, Louis Daguerre, refined the technique, until by 1839 (the same year that Colonel Charles Pasley began diving operations on the Royal George) the process was made public, and the word 'photography' came into existence. The Daguerreotype process produced a very good image and it soon became extremely fashionable to sit for a photographic portrait. Unfortunately exposure times were still very long, necessitating very still subjects, and the resultant image, produced on a tin plate, could not be reproduced

The Calotype

Meanwhile a rival system had been developed in England by William Henry Fox Talbot, a native, like Thompson, of Dorset. This was the so-called Calotype, a negative/positive process which was in fact the forerunner of modern photography. Fox Talbot produced negatives on impregnated light-sensitive paper from which he could print any number of further paper positives. Unfortunately during this early period the Calotype, although superior in concept to the Daguerreotype, produced an inferior image as a result of unavoidable imperfections in the paper negative.

During the 1840s, therefore, great efforts were made to produce a better negative. Glass was the most obvious base material, but the problem was how to make the light sensitive solution stick to the surface. In 1848 Abel Niepce de Saint Victor, a cousin of Nicephore, perfected a process of coating glass with albumen (egg white). Although this worked well, exposure times were still extremely long.

Wet Plate Collodion

In 1851 an Englishman, Frederick Scott Archer, revolutionized photography with the collodion process. Collodion was a viscous liquid made by dissolving gun-cotton in ether and alcohol. The material proved perfect for binding light-sensitive chemicals onto a glass plate. Exposure times were reduced to seconds rather than minutes, images were sharper than ever before, and any number of high quality prints could be made at around one-tenth the cost of a Daguerreotype. Moreover, Scott Archer did not seek to patent his process and as a result both amateur and professional photography expanded exponentially.

However the collodion process was not without disadvantage. The photographer had first to prepare his plate by spreading fresh collodion over the glass, sensitize it, and place it in the camera. The exposure then had to be made, the plate retrieved, and the picture developed and fixed, all whilst the glass remained wet. Thus a photographer, amateur or professional, had also to be something of a chemist. Meanwhile, the need to avoid inadvertently exposing the plate to unwanted light meant that location photography required not only the carriage of heavy equipment and chemicals, but the erection of a darkroom tent. The collodion 'wet plate' process, particularly for use outdoors, was therefore only for the dedicated enthusiast.

William Thompson possessed just such enthusiasm and the fact that he attempted his underwater photograph in 1856 - only five years after Scott Archer first revealed the process - shows just how revolutionary and daring the concept was.

THOMPSON'S OTHER PHOTOGRAPHS

Of course, it has to be said that Thompson's underwater photograph was a technical milestone rather than a great technical success. The image was ultimately disappointing, and given that the flooded camera would have required considerable repair, somewhat expensive. It is perhaps significant that Thompson appears not have repeated the experiment, despite alluding to an improved apparatus in his paper.

Nevertheless William Thompson did produce further underwater images, although these were taken in the comfort and safety of his own home, through the glass sides of an aquarium. Although lacking the romance of a true undersea photograph these images were startlingly clear, and would have required considerable technical effort to produce. Fortunately some of them, along with the Weymouth Bay picture and other photographs of Weymouth and Portland, are carefully preserved by William Thompson's descendants.

They include a photograph of the Portland Ferry Bridge taken around the time of the underwater experiment. The Ferry Bridge House (now Inn) can be seen at the far end of the bridge structure, whilst near the horizon is Wyke Regis church, where Thompson is now buried.

ON TAKING PHOTOGRAPHIC IMAGES UNDER WATER

William Thompson's Original Paper of 1856.

Sir,- Mr Penny , of Poole, has forwarded to me your communication.

I accordingly enclose you a positive copy, from a negative collodion plate, of a view of a portion of Weymouth Bay, taken at a depth of three fathoms.

The Plan I adopted was simple.

I was musing, as persons in our then unfortunate condition (namely weather-bound, and two miles from home and dinner) will muse; and my thoughts wandered to the effect the great force of the Fleet water would have on the piles of the bridge. I passed in review the piles carried away; and the divers aid called in to examine the amount of submarine damage, and the difficulties and expense which necessarily follow; and the idea occurred to me that the camera might considerably assist us.

I mentioned the idea at once to my friend Mr. Kenyon, and we agreed to test its value at the earliest opportunity. We partially succeeded at our first and only attempt, but non-amateur occupation has, for the present, prevented my further experimenting. I will now give you an outline of the plan on which I proceeded.

I knew that, could we sink a glass plate, prepared with collodion, to the bottom of the sea, in theory there was no reason why we should not obtain as good an image as we do on land, provided the sea water could be kept from the camera, and that the light was sufficient. I was not, sufficiently versed in optics and chemistry to know whether or not the water obstructed any and what light rays.

Following my idea, we made a box as nearly watertight as we could, and large enough to enclose the camera.

This box is fitted, in front with a piece of plate glass and on the outside is a wooden shutter, heavily leaded, and which is raised by a string attached to it and communicating with the boat.

On each side of the box is an iron band, terminating in a screw, and projecting beyond the back, which is loose, and fitted with an iron bar, having a hole at each end, through which the screws of the band pass, and thus the back is screwed down tight against the body of the camera by means of a nut; the inner surface of the back is padded, so as to make the camera box, as far as possible, watertight, when the back is screwed into its place.

The box is fixed to an iron tripod, and a band, with an eye on its upper margin, is passed round both camera, box, and stand; to this eye is attached the rope that lowers the camera to the sea bottom, and by which it is raised. This is the whole of the apparatus employed.

The first thing to be accomplished is to focus the camera, which is done as follows :-The camera is placed in the box on the shore, and a view is focused, taking as the foreground an object at ten yards distance. This I did with the view now sent, but I fear it is too much. I then fix the stand by means of a triangular wooden frame forced up between the legs of the tripod stand, and which is prevented from slipping down by being attached to the top of the tripod by a line; this keeps the camera frame the exact distance from the ground that it was when focused on land, and the camera being focused for the same distance, it stands to reason that, provided the optical and chemical properties are the same, we shall obtain a similarly good picture.

The next thing to be done is to prepare the plate and enclose it.

The plate is prepared with collodion, in the usual way, under a tent. It is then placed in the camera (my camera used for this purpose takes a plate 5 in. by 4 in.). I then take the camera to the box and stand, and throw a black cloth over all. I examine the shutter in front of the camera box to see that it is tight; then, uncapping the camera under the cloth, I place it in the box, and finally draw up the slide, I then push the camera completely into the box, until the front of the lens presses against the plate glass front of the box, and screw on the back tight. The camera is thus light tight, and properly focused; and nothing remains to be done but to lower it to the bottom of the sea.

Up to the present point everything has been done on land. We now lash the whole of the apparatus, properly set, to the stern of the boat, and, when we arrive at the proper spot, sink the camera. By means of the lowering rope we can find when the camera is upright at the bottom. When satisfied on this point, we raise the shutter in front of the camera box, by means of the string attached to it, and the other end of which communicates with the boat. The camera is now in action.

The time I allowed for my negative was ten minutes, and you will perceive it is a weak one. It took some time to develop with 3 grains of pyro-gallic acid to the ounce.

There are one or two points worthy of notice as having occurred in the experiment. The first is, that the image is formed on the plate in its natural position, and not inverted. From this it would appear that the piece of glass in front of the camera box, and the water conjointly, act in the same way as a parallel mirror.

Another fact is, that the salt water does not materially injure the plate. With all my care, the great pressure at the depth to which I sunk my camera forced the water into the camera itself, and covered the collodion plate.

When I opened the camera and found it full of water, I despaired of having obtained a view; but it would appear that salt water is not so injurious as I had feared. I took the precaution of washing the plate gently with fresh water, and then of dipping it, for an instant in the silver bath. The plate was exposed for ten minutes on an ordinary day in the month of February*; it took nearly the same time to develop with pyro-gallic acid, using Horne and Thornthwaite's collodion; you will see the negative is &, weak one.

I would draw your attention to the line of demarcation between the water and air, which is very visible. The plate was the second one I tried; the first I exposed for five minutes, and obtained no image; and by time I exposed the one I now send, the light had become very bad. I have not since made a trial, although I have had a better apparatus constructed. The view was taken in a nook of the bay of Weymouth, which is bounded by a ridge of rocks not rising in ordinary tides to nearly the surface of the water. The area within is of sand and boulders, and thickly clothed with seaweed's [sic], such as Laminaria saccharina, Chondrus crispus, Ryliphloea and many other species. This will assist you in deciphering the photograph.

This application of photography may prove of incalculable benefit to science. We may take (to a reasonable depth) sketches of submarine rocks, piers of bridges, outlines of sand-banks, in fact, everything that is required under water. Should a pier of a bridge require to be examined, you have but to suit your camera, and you will obtain a sketch of the pier, with any dilapidations; and the engineer will thus obtain far better information than he could from any report made by a diver.

My object in studying Photography is in order to illustrate objects of Natural History, as I unfortunately cannot use my pencil. I enclose you a sketch of the lump fish Cyclopterus lumpus, caught on the Chesil beach, and which is not a common fish.

I am, &c

WILLIAM THOMPSON.

Weymouth, May 6, 1856.

* Thompson was of course referring to an English February day. Readers in sunnier climes may like to know that this is usually pretty gloomy!