Colonel Wortley & Dog, Horse and Cat

John Stewart Wood, Henry Stuart Wortley & (possibly) Francis Colborne pose outside a stone hut. A blurred dog is visible in front of them, a horse stands in the background. A map tube hangs on the door (Roger Fenton, 1855).

During the Crimean War colonel Stuart Wortley's cat visited the doctor's hut to get a bayonet wound in the foot examined and bandaged. The colonel found her wounded after the battle of Malakoff and took her daily for a time to the regimental surgeon for treatment. But when he himself became ill she continued the visits of her own accord and sat quietly down for her usual treatment (from 'The Tiger in the House, A Cultural History of the Cat' by Carl Van Vechten).

After the war colonel Stuart Wortley (1832-1890) became a skilled and innovative photographer in his own right.

Lt. Colonel Henry Stuart Wortley 'Beached by the Tide' (about 1869), albumen print from a wet collodion negative.

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