Portrait of Auguste Vacquerie

Charles Hugo was the son of the celebrated writer, poet, and politician Victor Hugo. After the Napoleonic coup in 1851 the writer was compelled to flee to Jersey, an island off the Normandy coast. His two sons, Charles and François-Victor Hugo, and the poet Auguste Vacquerie stayed there with him. In this period the brothers experimented avidly with photography and produced all manner of portrait studies on paper negatives.