GREWSOME CAMERA WORK
Photographing the Dying and Those Cold In Death.
Hair Raising and Blood Curdling Tales Of the Profesh’.
Life Frequently Shorted by the Anxiety of Relatives to Obtain Pictures of Those Passing Away.
“Well I’ve just got through with a mighty disagreeable job,” remarked a young attache of one of the leading photograph studios as he hurried along the street the other day, a small case and tripod in his hand. “And it isn’t the first time since I entered the profession that I found that it was not all art and science or the mere ability to mix the chemicals and flash the camera. Since the subject has opened, I’ll tell you some of my experience.”
The young man, who has been an apprentice and practical photographer for about seven years, led the way to a neighboring seat, and after blowing the foam from the mouth of a mug, commenced: “Since I first entered a photograph gallery I have seen enough queer sights and been through enough hair-raising experiences to forever drive sleep from the eyes of a nervous and impressionable man, but a strong constitution and determination to overcome any squeamishness has carried me through.
“Many and many are the relatives who turn at once to things mundane when every thought should be on the spiritual, and the dying kinsman or woman must be photographed. No matter the association, the ghastliness or the agony depicted, the photographer is sent for, and then trouble begins. Although only one short lap from the yawning grave, the subject for the undertaker is instructed to sit up and smile! The idea of such a being smiling! The photographer is expected to carry out the full program and to take as fine a picture as under the most favorable auspices.
DEATH-BED SITTERS.
“The camera is adjusted, the breathing corpse is placed in the proper position, and the operator begins to think that he is going to get through the ordeal without the customary disagreeable features, when all of a sudden the poor subject gives a groan or a blood-curdling shriek and collapses. Nervous and fidgety, the operator waits until the poor mortal, whose span of life is cut short by such treatment, is propped up and prepared for the picture. Assisted by restoratives and urged by anxious friends, a superhuman effort is made by the poor one who is journeying over the river with the silent boatman, and a smile that haunts the photographer for many days is assumed as the position is once more taken. After several such trials, the sick and dying person, growing weaker and weaker each time, the picture is taken. Once more is the rapidly-sinking one permitted to rest and in a few hours gasps the last breath.
“The ordeal is simply terrifying to the photographer. Imagine a young man called upon to place in position and view a woman with the beads of death sweat and expression of a corpse staring at him as he adjusts his lenses, and then say if he can be expected to produce a perfect picture. And the picture is never satisfactory and no wonder. Ninety-nine cases in 100 they have waited too long to call in the photographer, and the result is that no one will take one of the pictures as a proper representation of the subject in life. That ghastly and dying expression lasts long enough in the minds of those who have viewed it, without being perpetuated by the aid of a camera.
“One of the most horrible incidents in this connection, and a scene I shall never forget to my dying day, occurred this afternoon when I was sent out to take the picture of a prominent society lady. Although suspecting the purpose of my errand, I was not prepared for what I saw. Having been attracted on several occasions by the lady’s marvelous beauty, I anticipated quite a pleasant hour’s work, and brushed my hair and adjusted my collar and tie with exceptional care before gathering my tools and repairing to the house. I was immediately shown up stairs and entered the lady’s apartment.
AN AWFUL EXPERIENCE.
Busied for some minutes making preparations for taking the picture, I paid little attention to what was going on in the other part of the room, but when I turned to arrange the position of the subject, what a sight greeted me. There before me lay the lady, but so changed that but a faint trace of her once great beauty remained. She seemed a skeleton or a vision from the other world, and I was so unnerved as to be perfectly helpless for a few moments. The lady, who was dying of lung trouble, looked kindly at me with great glistening eyes and informed me that she had agreed to oblige importunate friends and have her photograph taken before the last, and therefore hoped I would hurry. I arranged her in the most comfortable position possible and returned to complete the work. The last move, however, had been too much for her, and as she lay on the soft couch blood gushed from her lips in a stream. Though she should have been laid in her bed at once and everything done to assist her in her sinking hour, the selfish ones about her insisted on the picture, and, although my blood fairly boiled at such an outrage, after much difficulty I succeeded in taking the picture. That woman’s hours were shortened by many through the spirit of true womankind, never to disappoint or offend any one whatever the sacrifice might be, and I hope the ‘friends’ appreciate the photographs I finished for them. Poor persecuted woman!
“Then come the dead people. Although spending a life of worth and godliness while on earth, such a thing as a photograph is rarely thought of until after breath and reason take flight. Then the photographer is summoned and ordered to produce a good-looking picture of the corpse. That object or individual, whatever you might call him, her or it, is pounded and jammed until forced into a position which might be called graceful by an idiot or a relative of the deceased, and then the corpse is ‘shot.’ I don’t believe, unless in case of a baby, that two corpse pictures in a hundred are satisfactory. I remember one instance, however, that reflects great credit on the man who first thought of photographing corpses. I was called out one afternoon to photograph a fine-looking young man. The body was doubled in an extremely ungraceful position, and it took considerable work to arrange the subject for the camera, A final bend, accomplished by two stout men straining every muscle, had a most unexpected effect.
HE CAME TO LIFE.
“The man opened his eyes, looked about him, and asked the meaning of such treatment and surroundings, and that man is today one of the leading commercial factors in this city. Oh, I’ve photographed many a corpse, but I don’t believe there’s a man in the business who really likes the work.
“Scientists go to any extremes to further the development of scientific subjects, and in their enthusiasm lose all feeling of or for the outer world. In cases where peculiar subjects in medical science are brought to light a photographer of sensitive nature and velvet-lined constitution is invariably called upon to aid the scientist in preserving the discovery.
Memphis [TN] Daily Commercial 8 February 1891: p. 7
Chris Woodyard is the author of The Victorian Book of the Dead, The Ghost Wore Black, The Headless Horror, The Face in the Window, and the 7-volume Haunted Ohio series. She is also the chronicler of the adventures of that amiable murderess Mrs Daffodil in A Spot of Bother: Four Macabre Tales. The books are available in paperback and for Kindle. Indexes and fact sheets for all of these books may be found by searching hauntedohiobooks.com. Join her on FB at Haunted Ohio by Chris Woodyard or The Victorian Book of the Dead. And visit her newest blog, The Victorian Book of the Dead.
The Victorian Book of the Dead 