Sir John Frederic William Herschel (1792-1871), astronomer. Mezzotint portrait by William Ward after painting by H W Pickersgill (372x285mm, cut down)

This mezzotint engraving drawn by William Watson shows the astronomer Sir John F.H. Herschel. It is based on a portrait in oils, now at St John's College Cambridge, that William Henry Pickersgill painted around 1852. The only son of the famous astronomer Sir William Herschel, John Herschel continued the work of his father by mapping the Southern Skies. Between 1834-8 he observed from Feldhausen House near Table Mountain at Claremont six miles from Cape Town, South Africa. Using a 20-Foot reflecting telescope Herschel discovered thousands of new celestial objects whose position he carefully plotted. These were later published as, 'Results of Astronomical Observations made 1834-8 made at the Cape of Good Hope' in 1847.