In a post on June 15, I had reported that the credit for the earliest printed Christmas card must now be given to a certain Mr Clements in 1829. Diligent research has determined that this was an error and the 1842 card of John Callcott Horsley and Sir Henry Cole must be reinstated to its position of preeminence.
But one wonders exactly what it was this unfortunate youth was peddling in London in December 1842. From the court reporter section of the Illustrated London News:
A boy named Williams, about eleven years of age, was charged with selling prints in the streets, -The constable, 41 E, produced five little Christmas pieces, which he said he found on him. He saw the prisoner addressing a lady coming out of her house in Euston-square. He took him into custody, The prisoner, an innocent intelligent-looking child, said his mother lived in Westminster. She had given him a few pence in the morning to purchase prints in St. Paul’s Churchyard, he paid 5d. for seven of them.-Mr. Greenwood said the prints were very nicely coloured and executed, and he did not think they could be sold so cheap. -One of the officers of the court said they were sold at that rate. -The prisoner begged of his worship not to punish him, as he sold the prints for the support of a widow mother. He had done no harm, and hoped his worship would not punish him.—Mr. Greenwood said he considered it but as an excuse for begging, and he would punish the prisoner for that offence. He would send him to the House of Correction for fourteen days.
Though not exactly a Christmas card, a Yule-time card appeared in 1841 in Scotland, a land that had viewed Christmas with suspicion since the holiday’s abolition in the 1560s. A Leith printer, Charles Drummond, produced a card that, in true Scottish style, made no mention of Christmas but instead carried the traditional Hogmanay wish: “A Gude New Year, And Mony o’ Them”.
