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Thomas Babington Macaulay, Baron Macaulay

16 of 26 portraits of Thomas Babington Macaulay, Baron Macaulay

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Thomas Babington Macaulay, Baron Macaulay

by Maull & Polyblank
albumen print, arched top, published June 1856 (April 1856)
7 5/8 in. x 5 3/4 in. (195 mm x 147 mm) image size
acquired unknown source, 1938
Photographs Collection
NPG Ax7275

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Artistback to top

  • Maull & Polyblank (active 1854-1865), Photographers. Artist associated with 337 portraits.

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Events of 1856back to top

Current affairs

Queen Victoria introduces the Victoria cross, an award for British soldiers who displayed exceptional valour in battle. Each medal was produced from Russian guns captured in the British war. In 2006, Lance Corporal Johnson Beharry became the first living recipient of the Victoria Cross since 1965, for his actions in the Iraq war.

Art and science

The National Portrait Gallery is founded by Philip Henry Stanhope, 5th Earl of Stanhope, Thomas Babington Macaulay, and Thomas Carlyle, all biographers and historians. Historical rather than artistic in focus, the Gallery's aim was to collect original portraits of outstanding figures from British history, notably from politics, the arts, literature and science.
Elizabeth Barrett Browning publishes her epic and autobiographical poem Aurora Leigh.

International

The Treaty of Paris ends the Crimean war. Russia concedes to the Anglo-French-Austrian Four Points of August 1854 including the guarantee of Ottoman sovereignty and territorial integrity. Russia also agreed to a demilitarisation of the land islands in the Baltics, a term which lasted until the outbreak of the First World War.
Britain launches the second Opium war against China.

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