A Finely Engraved Turban Shell Featuring a Vignette of the International Exhibition of 1862, Attributed to Charles H. Wood

This fine work of art has been created from a natural turban shell which has been engraved with a penknife and then inked for contrast. It is highly likely to be the work of the renowned shell and scrimshaw engraver Charles H. Wood. The subject on this shell is a view of the site used for the 1862 International Exhibition in South Kensington (one the present day site of the V&A and other great Kensington museums) designed by Captian Francis Fowke. Although little is known of Wood’s career (see the results of our extensive research below), it is believed that he exhibited his shells at the 1851 Great Exhibition and sold pieces at the 1862 International Exhibition, probably from a stall outside of the main buildings. The present shell was likely made for sale at this time to one of the many thousands of visitors to the exhibition. Shells engraved or cut in cameo by Charles H. Wood are in museums and major private collections worldwide and one was presented to Queen Victoria by the artist himself.

Charles H. Wood (fl.1830-1870)

Little is known about the mysterious C. Wood but it has now been established beyond reasonable doubt that he was born Charles H. Wood and, according to new sources we have discovered, he was a Liverpool man and at one point worked for a ‘Mr Winsland, builder” in London. He was English by birth but enjoyed a truly international career, seemingly working in both America and Australia and selling his exceptional productions on board ships and at ports. In her article Advance Australia: C. H. Wood, Embellisher of Sea-Shells, Ox-Horn and Whale-Ivory, published in Australiana, November 1992, Susan M. Frank describes Wood’s career as an engraver beginning as follows:

‘In June 1845, on the occasion of the maiden transatlantic voyage of Isambard Kingdom Brunel’s revolutionary steamship Great Britain, an obscure English engraver named C.H. Wood produced an elaborate presentation piece expertly incised in the manner of whalemen’s scrimshaw on the luminous, pearl-like surface of a large seashell. Featuring portraits of the Great Britain and Great Western (another of Brunel’s ocean-going leviathans, launched in 1837), the shell is dedicated to Queen Victoria and her consort, Prince Albert, to whom Wood presented it as a gift. Whether or not his generosity was ever actually acknowledged at Windsor Castle, the artist was able to parlay the implication of royal patronage into a thriving souvenir business. His entire subsequent career and what little we know of him today are inextricably tied to the fame and ill-starred fortunes of Brunel’s controversial ships’.

Later in the article, Frank refers to Wood’s engraved cow horn pieces:

‘Around the same time that he was making shellwork souvenirs Wood was evidently also engaged in engraving bovine horn, work that he also promoted with his tenuous royal family connection. Most of it was evidently patriotic in character, such as a “pair of English ox horns dated 1857. Each horn engraved with the English Royal Arms within the Order Of the Garter outlined in brass studs and between inscriptions and poems, one signed by the engraver C.H. Wood, horn embellisher to HRH Prince Albert and Pearl Engraver to Her Most Gracious Majesty the Queen.” However, two of his pieces are not so easily categorised and present an intriguing mystery about the artist’s travels and his whereabouts at the time of engraving, as they imply that at one point he served in the Yankee whale fishery and on this or some other occasion may have visited Australia’.

Two engraved horns previously in our collection, one signed and one not, add further to this small corpus of surviving pieces. Wood is believed to have exhibited his carved shells at the Great Exhibition in 1851 and the International Exhibition of 1862. A nautilus shell engraved with a view of the Great Eastern steamship is in the collection of the Yale Center for British Art

https://collections.britishart.yale.edu/catalog/orbis:10166587

another is in the SS Great Britain Museum

https://www.ssgreatbritain.org/collection-stories/engraved-nautilus-shell-1845/

and a conch shell engraved to commemorate the death of Prince Albert is in the British Museum

https://www.britishmuseum.org/collection/object/H_2007-8040-1

Susan M. Frank also contributed an article on Wood to the Dictionary of Scrimshaw Artists, published in 1991.

Research in the British Newspaper Archive has allowed us to shed further light on Wood’s career and work. The first reference we discovered is in Carlisle Patriot, dated the 24^th of January 1845. Wood is described as

‘an artisan in the employ of Mr Winsland, builder, London’ and the article relates the story of his presenting a shell to the King and Queen.

On the 25^th of April 1849, Wood found himself in front of a judge having been accused of stealing two pairs of children’s shoes when drunk. The case was dismissed but not before an account of Wood’s talent was given to the court. An account in the London Evening Standard, on the 26^th of April reveals that Wood’s engraved shell, mentioned in Frank’s article, was indeed accepted by the Royal family and that ‘a sum in gold was presented to him in return by his Sovereign”. He later received a package from the Queen including a framed proof engraving of the coronation by Hayter. Another article on this same court case was published in John Bull on the 30^th of April 1849. There is further material of interest in this piece as it describes the fact that Wood was on his way to sell two of his engraved shells to a lady who had agreed to purchase them before he got drunk. Additionally, the article states that Wood’s lawyer told the court that Wood had

‘gained great celebrity for his power of engraving on shells. Although a painter, he had taught himself to engrave in the most beautiful manner on shells’.

This is the only reference located so far that refers to Wood’s profession and, as such, is extremely interesting.

Perhaps more fascinating still is an article published in the Liverpool Daily Post on the 26^th of October 1861. It reads

‘Mr C. H.Wood, the celebrated shell engraver connected with the Great Eastern, in accordance of his usual custom of bestowing an engraved shell on the mayor of whatever port the ship may enter, intends in a day or two to present one of his wonderful specimens to our worthy chief magistrate”

These newspaper accounts do suggest that the reason that Wood’s pieces survive is that they were almost always treasured presentation pieces and not tourist souvenirs as has been thought to be the case until now. A further newspaper account, published long after Wood’s death in the Huddersfield and Holmfirth Examiner on the 21^st of November 1964 sheds further light on Wood and his activities. The article illustrates two carved nautilus shells which had passed down through the family of a Mrs Crowther to her granddaughter Mrs Byram.

‘Apparently the Crowthers became very friendly with the captain on their journey (aboard the Great Eastern) and he gave them the shells to remind them of the Great Eastern.

Obviously the captain C. H.. Wood was (like many sailors) good with his hands, and the shells are beautifully inscribed..’

If the article is to be believed then it would seem that Mr Wood was captain of the Great Eastern. However a list of the captains on the ship does not include Wood’s name so this seems likely to have been a mistake made by the journalist at this time.

An article published in the Ulverston Mirror and Furness Reflector on the 6^th of September 1862 quotes from another article published in the “Preston paper”. It records Wood presenting an engraved shell to the Mayor of Preston that same year as well as a sculptured bulla ova egg which he gave to the Mayoress. There are three details in this article which are of particular interest. The first is that Wood is described as ‘Mr C. H. Wood of Liverpool, sculptor and engraver on shells’, seemingly establishing a little more about the life of this fascinating man. Secondly the article ends by mentioning that Wood ‘whilst connected with the Great Eastern made similar presents to the mayors of London, Southampton, Cork, Liverpool &c”, suggesting that Wood was no longer connected to the ship at this stage. Finally, the description of the shell presented to the Mayor of Preston includes ‘a beautifully engraved figure, representing Peace, seated on the prow of a vessel, and pointing to the victory achieved by the great English hero Nelson’.

In addition to the range of shells engraved by Wood discussed above, there is also one other carved horn which is attributed to Wood and is known as “The Horn of Australia” due to its iconography relating to that country. It is in the collection of the Kendall Whaling Museum in the US but is now on loan to the Australian National Maritime Museum, Sydney.