Cyril Hawkesworth. 1920s Railway Photographer.

I have possessed for over forty years two small cases full of 1920s railway photographs. Some were taken by Cyril Hawkesworth, whose widow gave me this material just before she died around 1970, Cyril having died some years earlier. This blog concentrates on his own images (he also collected commercially available postcard images, which I have). Cyril lived in Southampton and his local station was Southampton West. Before being too critical, please consider the technology of the time. Here is the back of a typical print:

In addition to the date and engine number (the A is the power type), the timetabled destination is given, including departure time.  The photographic information at the bottom: the camera is set to 100 feet distance, aperture 5.6, and the exposure time a fiftieth of a second.  The 836 on this photo is still a mystery, as is the word Def after the number. I know nothing of which camera he used, but negatives are celluloid the same size as the prints. There are often initials at the top which I think refer to the friends he went with. He obviously kept a notebook at the time, from which details were added to the back of each print.