Mr. Lincoln's Photographer

[Christopher Handy]

(02-05-2014 06:38 PM)L Verge Wrote:  I had a lengthy phone conversation today with a gentleman who said that, years ago, Mathew Brady's granddaughter had given him (this gentleman) copies of many of Brady's photographs. This gave me a bit of pause because I had never even thought about Brady being married, let alone a father.

Well, I found that Mathew Brady had been married to a Juliet Handy of D.C., but they had no children. This gentleman on the phone had promised me copies of his copies of Brady materials, so I chalked up another question mark as to their provenance. It appears that what was left after Brady's failure in business went to a nephew by marriage. Maybe it was the nephew's granddaughter who had the materials. I may never know.

I found this thread a bit late, but I feel like I should reply, as I have some personal knowledge, here. The above sounds extremely unlikely. Brady's nephew, who ended up with a large number of his negatives, was Levin Corbin Handy (my great-great-grandfather's brother; Mathew Brady is my 4th great-uncle, by marriage); Levin C. Handy died in 1932, and left his photographic business and negatives including the ones he had from Brady to his daughters, Mary Handy Evans and Alice Handy Cox; they sold the negatives to the National Archives in 1954, where they form the "Brady-Handy Collection". Mary Handy Evans died in 1957, and Alice Handy Cox died in 1964; Levin C. Handy only had one granddaughter, and she died in 1951.

Levin C. Handy, in the 1920's, advertised reproductions of various Civil War era photographs; this seems like a much more likely provenance (assuming this was their ultimate source).