Solar eclipse photograph taken with the Kew Photoheliograph

One of four diapositive photographs in passe partout frame showing the Sun during the partial phase of the 1860 solar eclipse viewed from Northern Spain. Originals taken by Warren De La Rue using the Kew photoheliograph.

Photographic glass slide, taken the 1860 Solar Eclipse, showing the Sun partly obscured by the Moon. The picture taken by Warren De La Rue (1815-1889), a pioneer of astrophotography, was obtained in Northern Spain using the Kew Photoheliograph, a telescope specially designed to photograph the Sun. Photographs taken at totality, when the Sun was fully hidden, showed the solar corona, a ghostly halo of pearly light. Similar images taken elsewhere first showed this to be an intrinsic solar feature rather an effect produced by the Earth's atmosphere.