Images of Wilkie

Images of Wilkie Collins were taken throughout his life. His father, his brother, and artist friends made numerous drawings and paintings of him. Once he became famous, photographers in London, New York and Boston took and published numerous photographs of him. Engravings, sometimes taken from these photographs, were published in newspapers, periodicals and even some of his books - especially those published in the United States. Later he became the subject of caricature and cartoon.

This archive presents more than one hundred images of Wilkie in as close to date order as can be done. Some of the dates given are publication dates and may be considerably later than the date when the image was taken. The images are drawn from various sources, including my own collection, and describe the origin, date and artist or photographer wherever possible. The archive is updated whenever I come cross a new available image. So check back for updates. The most recent image chronologically is by a Spanish artist in 2011.

There is a separate page of Photographs of Wilkie Collins with more details about the photographs and his attitude to photography.

I am always interested in acquiring images of Wilkie Collins. Please email me if you have artefacts to sell - or images you are willing to share on these pages.

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COPYRIGHT NOTICE
If you want to use any of these images check who owns the copyright. If there is no copyright information then I own copyright in the image stored here. In that case you are free to use it in any non-profit making website or in your own non-profit making documents, on condition you credit this website and provide a link to it. If you want to use one of my images in a commercial publication or enterprise, then please e-mail me about a licence. If there is copyright information given, check with the copyright holder before using the image.


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CHILDHOOD

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1824 - age 0
Drawn by Wilkie's father William Collins R.A., probably in Wilkie's first year.
Taken from Kenneth Robinson Wilkie Collins1951.
 

1833 - age 9
Painting by the Scottish artist Andrew Geddes (1783-1844) a cousin of Wilkie's mother Harriet.

1850s

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1850s - age 26
Painting by John Everett Millais (1829-1896), a lifelong friend of Wilkie. This image is courtesy of the National Portrait Gallery which holds the copyright in it.

1853 - age 29
An oil portrait Wilkie by his brother Charles Allston Collins painted in 1853. The last known image of Wilkie beardless. The painting is in the Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge which owns the copyright in this image. See 1956 for a drawing based on this image.

1857 - age 33
Cabinet photograph by Herbert Watkins, 215 Regent Street. The first image of Wilkie with a beard. Originally published in The Critic 5 June 1858 but probably dates from 1857.

1857 - age 33
Taken from Gladys Storey Dickens and Daughter London 1939. Clearly the same as the 1857 Herbert Watkins photograph above..

1857 - age 33
A poor engraving from an original photograph by Herbert Watkins taken at the same sitting as the image above. Published in The Train June 1857 p.353

1860s

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1861 - age 37
Photograph taken by Cundall, Downes & Co. of 168 New Bond Street. It was tipped in to the first one volume edition of The Woman in White Sampson Low, Son, & Co. London 1861.

1861 - age 37
Photograph by Herbert Watkins of 215 Regent Street. Wilkie gave him exclusive rights to a full length portrait. This image was taken shortly after the image above, published in The Woman in White. A version of it was reused in 1912.

1862 - age 38
Drawn by Leslie Ward aged 11. He later became well known as 'Spy' the cartoonist who produced many of the caricatures published by Vanity Fair
Taken from S.M.Ellis Wilkie Collins, Le Fanu and others London 1931.

1862 - age 38
Drawing by Rudolf Lehmann (1819-1905), brother of Wilkie's friend Frederick Lehmann. 
This image published in Andrew Gasson Wilkie Collins - an Illustrated Guide OUP 1998.
Image © Andrew Gasson 2000.

1862 - age 38
A rather strange image used as the frontispiece to No Name published by Gardner A. Fuller & Co. in Boston in January 1863, probably before the Harper edition. It is now thought that this image is not one sanctioned by Wilkie Collins and, if taken from a photograph, is almost unrecognisable.

1862 - age 38
A portrait by an unknown artist dated 1862 but clearly taken from the 1857 H Watkins photograph.

Image © Andrew Gasson 2000.

1863 - age 39
Engraved frontispiece to No Name Harper & Brothers, New York, 1863. Clearly taken from the 1857 Watkins photograph above. Also used in the second weekly part in Harper's Weekly.

1864 - age 40
Photograph by Cundall, Downes & Co. of 168 New Bond Street. They took a series of images used as a frontispiece to the 1861 one volume edition of The Woman in White. The book sold so well that as the glass negatives became unusable Collins returned to sit for them at least through to 1864. This image is thought to be from that date.

1864 - age 40
Apparently a copy of the Cundall, Downes image above, though also similar to the Lehmann drawing above. The original photograph has the words COPYING COMPANY in a line crossing the bottom of the beard.

1864 - age 40
Photograph by Cundall, Downes & Co. of 168 New Bond Street. They took a series of images used as a frontispiece to the 1861 one volume edition of The Woman in White. The book sold so well that as the glass negatives became unusable Collins returned to sit for them at least through to 1864. This image is thought to be from that date and from the same sitting as the picture above.

1864 - age 40
A similar image from a different side and possibly taken from another image by Cundal, Downes at the same sitting. Published by the London Stereoscopic & Photographic Company sometime after 1873 but clearly from this earlier date.

1864 - age 40
Photograph by John and Charles Watkins of 34 Parliament Street.

1864 - age 40
Photograph by John and Charles Watkins of 34 Parliament Street.

1864 - age 40
Photograph by John and Charles Watkins of Parliament Street.
Taken from E M Ward Memories of Ninety Years London 1924

1866 - age 42
Photograph by Elliott & Fry of 55 Baker Street. The date of 1866 is not certain. But a letter from Wilkie dated September 1866 refers to three different portraits and says they are available from Elliott & Fry.

1866 - age 42
Another of the three different portraits by Elliott & Fry of 55 Baker Street. The date of 1866 is not certain. But a letter from Wilkie dated September 1866 refers to three different portraits and says they are available from Elliott & Fry. The engraving below was clearly taken from a slightly less cropped version of this image, or one from the same sitting.

1866 - age 42
Based on the photograph above by Elliott & Fry of 55 Baker Street. Published in The Bookman June 1912.

1866 - age 42
Clearly one of the same series of pictures taken by Elliott & Fry. Published in Reminiscences of an Active Life by John Bigelow 1913.

1868 - age 44
Caricature of Wilkie as part of a larger page illustrating a spoof of his play No Thoroughfare. Signed by H. Harral, it is based in reverse on the 1857 Watkins photograph above and is the earliest known published caricature of Wilkie.
Published in The Mask February 1866, the full picture page includes Dickens and actors from the play. 

1869 - age 45
The date of this fine engraving is unknown but it is associated with a document dated 5 April 1869.

1870s

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1870 - age 46
Engraved frontispiece to Man and Wife Harper & Brothers New York 1870. Apparently taken from the Elliott and Fry picture above.

1870 - age 46
Engraved image in Appleton's Journal of Popular Literature, Art, and Science, New York, 3 September 1870.

1870s - age 40s
Photograph published no earlier than 1873 by the London Stereoscopic Company. Maybe a copy of am image taken by Watkins in the same sitting as above.

1870s - age 40s
Clearly taken in the same chair and at the same time as the picture above. Reprinted in 1960 in the arts weekly John O'London's.

1871 - age 47
Taken by Elliott and Fry of 55 Baker Street, possibly in 1871.
Taken from Frank Archer An Actor's Notebooks London [1912].

1871 - age 47
Another copy, cropped, of the image above.
Taken by Elliott and Fry of 55 Baker Street, possibly in 1871.

1871 - age 47
Image by Elliott and Fry of 55 Baker Street. Two examples of versions of the image above.

1871 - age 47
Image by Elliott and Fry of 55 Baker Street. A smaller version of the image above.

1871 - age 47
Image by Elliott and Fry of 55 Baker Street, probably taken at the same time as the image above in a slightly less formal pose. None of these dates is certain.

1871 - age 47
Drawing by Thomas Downey based on the image above by Elliott and Fry. The drawing could have been done in 1905 for his brother Edmund's book of recollections Twenty Years Ago where it appears.

1871 - 47
Engraving published in The Graphic 16 December 1871 and clearly based on the Elliott & Fry images above. Identical to the engraving used by Harper in 1873 below.

1872 - age 48
Caricature published on 3 February 1872 in Vanity Fair. The artist was Adriano Cecioni, an Italian painter and sculptor, who was born and died in Florence. More on Vanity Fair and this image.

1872 - age 48
Caricature published in February 1872 in Once a Week. The artist was Frederick Waddy. He depicts Wilkie in front of the poster for the play of The Woman in White which was currently playing at the Olympic Theatre in London.

1872 - age 48
Engraved frontispiece to Poor Miss Finch Harper & Brothers, New York 1872. Note similarity with the 1871 image above and the 1873 and 1875 image below.

1873 - age 49
Engraving on the front cover of Harper's Weekly 8 March 1873, accompanying a biography of Wilkie anticipating his US visit. See the 1871 engraving in The Graphic above.

1873 from 1866
This tiny image is on a CDV showing 45 performers represented by the American Literary Bureau. It is taken from the 1866 Elliott & Fry image.

1873 - age 49
Photograph taken by Warren of 289 Washington Street, Boston and Cambridgeport, probably on Collins's first visit to the city in October 1873 but possibly on his return in January 1874. Only one version of this image is known but there is variety in the Warren imprint on the reverse.
1873 - age 49 - probably from 1866
Part of a large illustration from a collage of people who gave public lectures in Harper's Weekly. The engraving by C S Reinhart may be have been taken from the American Literary Bureau image above.

1874 - age 50
Photograph by the New York photographer Napoleon Sarony of 680 Broadway. Taken on Wilkie's visit there in 1874. Wilkie wears a coat.

1874 - age 50
Another image from the series of photograph by the New York photographer Napoleon Sarony, with Wilkie wearing a coat. Taken on Wilkie's visit there in 1874.

Image © Andrew Gasson 2000.

1874 - age 50
Yet another image in the 'coat' series of photographs by the Napoleon Sarony taken on Wilkie's visit to New York in 1874.

1874 - age 50
A full length image from the series of photographs by Napoleon Sarony taken on Wilkie's visit to New York in 1874. Wilkie wears a fur coat over his suit.

1874 - age 50
Although there is no Sarony name on this cdv it is clearly another pose of the full length image above.

1874 - age 50
This three-quarter length image appears to be a pirate version of the Sarony image above. There is no indication of photographer or date.

1874 - aged 50
Another in the series of photographs by the New York photographer Sarony. This one taken full length in the fur coat examining a vase which can be seen in an image above on the dresser behind Collins.

1874 - aged 50
Another in the series of photographs by the New York photographer Sarony with Wilkie wearing a fur coat.

1874 - aged 50
Another in the series of photographs by the New York photographer Sarony. In this image Wilkie wears a square patterned cravat.

1874 - age 50
Pair of stereo photographs by the New York photographer Napoleon Sarony of 680 Broadway. Taken on Wilkie's visit there in 1874. In this and the following Sarony images Wilkie wears a spotted cravat.

1874 - age 50
Apparently a larger mono image taken from one of the images used for the stereo pair. Shows Wilkie seated in a chair looking at pamphlets. With a signature glued on.

1874 - age 50
Another in the series of photographs by Napoleon Sarony, 680 Broadway. Clearly done at the same time and in the same costume as the stereo image.

1874 - age 50
Engraved frontispiece to My Miscellanies Harper & Brothers, New York, June 1874 and Chatto & Windus, London 1875. Engraved by E Halpin. Possibly based on an Elliott & Fry picture taken in 1871 and clearly earlier than photographs of this date taken in America.

1874 - age 50
Published by T B Peterson & Brothers of Peterborough on the front wrapper of a series of 11 paper wrapped pirate editions of Wilkie's works, published in 1874.

1875 - age 51
Woodcut frontispiece to Alicia Warlock, William F Gill, Boston 1875.
Similar to 1874 Halpin engraving above.

1875 - age 51
Signed A.B. (Alfred Bryan) and possibly from the Illustrated Sporting and Dramatic News. Probably dates from 1875 when The New Magdalen was at Charing Cross Theatre.

1876 - age 52
Probably taken from the Elliott & Fry photograph of 1871, this image is part of a composite photographic image showing nine novelists in Hughes and Edmonds English Celebrities of the Nineteenth Century, London 1876.

late 1870s based on 1873
An engraving on a card from a happy families game. Clearly based on the image taken by Warren in late 1873.

1879 - age 55 This photograph by John Jabez Edwin Mayall is dated 'c.1879' on the back but is could be later.

Image © Andrew Gasson 2002.

1880s

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1880s - around 60
Published frontispiece to The Moonstone, undated, by A L Burt in New York, probably in the mid 1880s.

1880 - age 56
Painting by Rudolf Lehmann (1819-1905), brother of Wilkie's friend, Frederic Lehmann. 
This image is courtesy of the National Portrait Gallery which holds the copyright in it.

1880 - age 56
Apparently a copy by an unknown artist of the Lehmann painting above.

1880 - age 56
Photograph by Lock and Whitfield.
Published as a Woodburytype in a book in 1880 together with a biography.

1880 - age 56
Photograph by Lock and Whitfield - see above.
Taken from William Winter Old Friends New York 1909.

1882 - age 58
Caricature by Edwin Linley Sambourne (1844-1910), published in Punch 14 January 1882. It depicts Collins doing 'Ink and Penance' for his novel The Black Robe  widely seen as anti-Catholic.

1884 - age 60
Photograph by Alexander Bassano, 72 Piccadilly, London
The 1895 Munsey's Magazine illustration below seems to be based on a similar image. And the 1908 Scribner image is the same.
1884 - age 60
Reproduction from an unknown book probably published in New Zealand of Bassano's photograph above or one taken at the same time.

1884 - age 60
Photograph by Alexander Bassano. Published as Society Bijou Portraits No.96. 

1884 - age 60
Cabinet photograph by Alexander Bassano of Old Bond Street, London. 

1884 - age 60
Published by Sophus Williams in Berlin, the photographer was listed as E Hader. The image is dated 1884 and apparently signed by Wilkie Collins. However, it could be a poor copy of a Sarony image taken ten years earlier.

1884 aged 60
Published in The St. Louis Illustrated Magazine June 1884 p243 to illustrate a short essay about Wilkie Collins by Alexander N De Menil.

1884 aged 60
Published as a small card in the Daily Historic series. Clearly from about this date but no other information about this card is known.

1886 - age 62
Woodcut illustration from The Leisure Hour Library published by F.M.Lupton New York, 7  August 1886 to accompany 'The Morwick Farm Mystery', an alternative title for 'John Jago's Ghost' or 'The Dead Alive'. Artist unknown but credited to Associated Pictorial Press.

1887 from 1871
This full page reproduction is taken from one of the 1871 photographs by Elliott & Fry. It was the frontispiece to a periodical called Men and Women 5 February 1887 accompanying a long biographical and autobiographical essay about Wilkie's early life. 

1888 - age 64
A profile photograph taken late in life and used as a model for numerous obituary pictures and the model for the Lupton frontispiece published in the 1890s. Taken by Alexander Bassano. This image is a reproduction of a cabinet photograph used by a picture agency in the 1920s.

1888 - age 64
Another image of the Bassano photograph, this one signed by Collins.

Image © Andrew Gasson 2003.

1888 - age 64
Illustration by unknown engraver from Thomas Herringsaw The Biographical Review of Prominent Men and Women of the Day 1888, published in America.

1889 - age 65
An engraving in The Cottage Hearth published in Boston, Massachusetts in October 1889 with a short biography, apparently unaware that Wilkie was already dead.
1889 - age 65
This engraving was published in Frank Leslie's Illustrated Newspaper and is based on a photograph taken in 1874 by Napoleon Sarony in New York. See related images of that date.

POSTHUMOUS

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1889 from 1871
This engraving accompanied Wilkie's obituary in Harper's Weekly 5 October 1889. It is clearly related to the 1873 Harper's engraving but is different in details.

1889 - age 65
This engraving, signed RT, accompanied Wilkie's obituary in the Illustrated London News  28 September 1889. Based on the photograph published above.

1889 - age 65
This engraving was published in The Graphic 28 September 1889 following Wilkie's death on 23 September. The signature on the engraving has not been deciphered. It is identical to that used in the Paris newspaper Nouvelles du Monde below.

1889 - age 65
This engraving, indistinctly signed, accompanied Wilkie's obituary in a Paris newspaper Nouvelles du Monde. Clearly related to other images of the time and apparently identical to the Graphic engraving above..

1890
An engraving in a German newspaper Illustrirte Welt 1890. Based on a photograph taken at the same time as the image below.

Image © Andrew Gasson 2003.

1890s
A photograph published as the frontispiece to The Yellow Mask F.M.Lupton, New York c.1890.

1893 from 1875
Cheap photographic print used on a card for a game Authors Illustrated, a sort of Happy Families game published by Clarke & Sowdon in 1893. 
Clearly based on the 1875 Halpin engraving.

1895 from 1870
This engraving appears to be re-engraved from the 1870 image published in Appleton's Journal. This version was published in How to Read Character; A New Illustrated Hand-Book of Phrenology and Physiognomy 1895.

1895 from 1875
Published as the frontispiece to the 30 volume Works of Wilkie Collins Peter Fenelon Collier, New York c1895.
Based on the 1875 Halpin engraving but aged with lighter beard and hair.

1895 from 1880s
A drawing published in Munsey's Magazine in 1895 illustrating a piece 'The Novel'. Some relationship to the earlier 1880s Bassano photographs above.

1895 from 1880s
Published as the frontispiece to a prospectus for the 30 volume Works of Wilkie Collins Peter Fenelon Collier, New York c1895. Based on the full length Bassano photograph c.1880.

Image © Andrew Gasson 2005

1898
Illustration on the spine of a 1898 edition of John Jasper's Secret, wrongly attributed to Wilkie Collins but written by New York journalist Henry Morford.

20th CENTURY

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1900 from 1871
A small tobacco card by Ogden Ltd from a set of General Interest cards. Probably from an 1871 Elliott and Fry photograph.

1900s from 1874
A card from a game of Happy Families where authors had to be collected. Clearly based on the 1874 Sarony photograph.

1908 from 1880s
Frontispiece to the 1908 edition of The Woman in White by Charles Scribner's Sons, New York. One of the Bassano photographs from the 1880s.
1910 from 1850s
This illustration is from The Green Book for Boys ed. Herbert Strang which includes Wilkie's account of going down a copper mine from Ramble Beyond Railways.

1912 from 1861
Published in Charles Dickens as Editor by R C Lehmann, London 1912. It is taken from one of the variants of the Watkins full length image of 1861.

1912 from 1870s
Published on the front cover of The Bookman June 1912 which carried a feature on Wilkie with several pictures. It shows clear similarities with the Halpin engraving (1875) and the Elliott & Fry image of 1871. 

Image © Andrew Gasson 2003.

1912 from 1874
Published as a plate in The Bookman June 1912, taken from a photograph by Sarony given by Wilkie to his agent Alexander Watt.

1919 from 1880s
Drawing by Pennsylvania artist Rudolph E Leppert (1872-1949) clearly taken from a Bassano picture of the 1880s which were widely used in books at the time.

1926 from 1880
A rather poor newsprint reproduction from the 1880 Lock & Whitfield Woodburytype above.

1928 from 1880
A similarly poor newsprint reproduction from the 1880 Lock & Whitfield Woodburytype above, this one in John O'London's Weekly..

1934 from 1870s
Full page front cover illustration for a Spanish translation of A Rogue's Life published in newspaper format. Not identified with any particular portrait.

1930s from 1880s
Frontispiece to The Woman in White published by Odhams in the 1930s. Signed DEM. Not clearly based on any identifiable contemporary image.

1930s from 1880s
An image on a Royal Staffordshire bone china thimble, probably dating from the 1930s but using images from the 1880s.

1946 from 1889
Illustration to a short biography in the Classic Comics version of The Moonstone Gilberton, New York 1946. Based on the 1889 image above.

1949 from 1850
Apparently taken from the 1850 Millais portrait, this picture illustrated a short biography in the Classic Illustrated comic book version of The Woman in White Gilberton New York 1949.

1952
Frontispiece to The Woman in White ed. E C R Lorac published by Collins in 1952. Artist unidentifed.

1955 from 1861
An image used to illustrate the Penguin edition of The Moonstone and clearly from one of the images by Cundall, Downes & Co. used in the 1861 one volume edition of The Woman in White.

1956 from 1853
Drawing by an unknown illustrator based on the 1853 portrait of Wilkie by his brother Charles Allston Collins. The last known image of Wilkie beardless. Taken from Nuel Pharr Davis The Life of Wilkie Collins Urbana 1956.

1972 from early 1860s
Image from the jacket of The Hungry Goblin by John Dickson Carr. Set in 1869, the book includes Wilkie Collins. Based on the Herbert Watkins photograph from the early 1860s.

1977
Strange image on the inside back cover of Marvel Classics Comics version of The Moonstone

1997 from 1850
Illustration by Mark Lang on the cover of The Hoydens and Mr. Dickens, the third in a series of pastiche tales by William J Palmer. Appears to be based on the 1850 Millais portrait.

1999 from 1872
Image of Wilkie on a mural in the entrance of the supermarket Waitrose, Marylebone High Street, London. Possibly taken from the engraving used in the 1872 Harper edition of  Poor Miss Finch. It is by the Carmarthen based ceramic artists Carlo Briscoe and Edward Dunn.

21st CENTURY

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2000 from 1850
Illustration by Mark Lang on the cover of The Dons and Mr. Dickens, the fourth in a series of pastiche tales by William J Palmer. Appears to be a reversed image based on the 1850 Millais portrait.

2000s
The date of this image is not known but it is probably early 21st century. It is from a Japanese website devoted to Collins. Copyright permission sought.

2006
This illustration by Jonathan Twingley accompanied a piece about The Moonstone in an online newspaper called The Stranger published in Seattle. Drawing by Jonathan Twingley ©2007 www.twingley.com
2011
An interesting drawing by Piero Pierini used as the cover of Brief Lives - Wilkie Collins by Melisa Klimaszewski and published by Hesperus Press in March 2011. ©Piero Pierini 2011
2011
A fine illustration by the Spanish artist Luis Grañena Lopez http://www.seis-cuatro.com accompanying a piece in the New Yorker. Used with the kind permission of the artist ©2011 Luis Grañena

 

Images of Wilkie 
v. 1.124.2
13 September 2012


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