Julia Margaret Pattle , Photographer. Oxford DNB: She was not the only Victorian woman photographer, but for most others,however enthusiastic, photography was primarily a means of creating a family record. She was born at Garden Reach, Calcutta, India, on 11 June1815, fourth of the ten children of James Pattle (1775-1845) and his wife, Adeline de l'âEtang (1793?-1845). Her mother was from a family of French aristocrats; her father had risen through the East India Company to hold a number of important legal and administrative positions. The Pattle family was prominent in Anglo-Indian society. Julia married her husband, Charles Hay Cameron (1795-1880) in Calcutta on 1 February 1838. He was a Benthamite liberal reformer, a classical scholar, a jurist, and (between 1843 and 1848) the legal member of the Council of India; his published work includes Address to parliament on the duties of Great Britain to India in respect of the education of the natives, and their official employment (1853). Mrs Cameron's most notable charitable achievement being the organization of the Calcutta relief fund for the Irish potato famine of 1845, which raised £14,000. Mrs Cameron was a noted conversationalist; during the 1840s she was effectively the first lady of Anglo-Indian society, acting as organizer and hostess of the social engagements of the governor-general, Lord Henry Hardinge. Even in this role, however, she reputedly demonstrated her unconventionality with her readiness to include Indians-albeit those whom she perceived as respectable and educated-on her guest list.
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