Handsome 1890's mahogany hand camera with brass fittings, leather bellows and a removable brilliant viewfinder on the top—proper early photography kit with lovely cabinet presence. The front carries a rotary control ring marked to 5–10–25, with the original slip-on cap to the lens; the rear has a ground-glass focusing screen in a hinged back. With it come three quarter-plate wooden dark slides and an old Wellington & Ward “Anti-Screen” plate box for display. There’s a small retailer’s label to the side from a Glasgow photographic dealer.

J.F. Shew & Co. was established in 1849 and around 1885 delivered the first Eclipse under the name Eclipse Instantaneous Hand Apparatus, based on the patent by G. Lowdon no. 4102 from 1895. The Shew Eclipse is a side gate strut camera made in Spanish mahogany and is arguably the first of many similar cameras that were made in England and notably in France.

Condition appears very good but has not been tested for function.