infocus #35 September 2014 The Rev. Joseph Bancroft Reade

The Rev. Joseph Bancroft Reade, M.A. FRS (1801-1870) was a keen microscopist and indeed, as the following text shows, was also a pioneer of photography throughout much of the 19th Century. He was a Fellow of the Royal Society, a founding Member of the Microscopical Society of London and was President of the later Royal Microscopical Society in 1869-70.

DOI: 10.22443/rms.inf.1.111

Joseph Bancroft Reade, 1 eldest son of Thomas Shaw Bancroft Reade by Sarah his first wife, daughter of Richard Paley, was born on 5 April 1801 at his father’s house in Kirkgate, Leeds, and baptized on 23 July at the Parish Church. He was educated at the Leeds Grammar School. Like his brother Richard he did not proceed straight from the School to the University, but was placed for a time under the care of a clergyman, as is shown by a remark in a letter of his father’s on 3 April 1819 to Miss Susan Salmon (a cousin of T. S. B. Reade).

Return to listing