Old portraits of children with creepy 'ghostmothers' in the background show how far mums would go for a good photo


In the early days of photography, many well-off families jumped at the chance to have their precious children's likeness captured for eternity.

The one trick that they had to deal with next, after finding photographers willing to set up the bulky equipment and travelling to the portrait location, was getting the little babies to sit still for the entirety of the session.

As a result, many photographers enlisted the help of the children's mothers, with often creepy outcomes.

Tricks: Mothers covered themselves in black cloth and hold their children upright while getting portraits taken back in the 1800s, resulting in odd figures in the photos



Well that's an odd looking chair: Children sat on the covered laps of their 'hidden' mothers during photo portrait sessions

A Flickr collection of various portraits appear to include so-called 'ghostmothers', which is the name given to the mothers who tried to hide themselves in the portrait as they sat there with their child during the session.



In a handful of portraits, there is an eerie cloaked figure behind the infant covered in a black sheet or ornate rug.

Sometimes, the child would be sitting upright on the lap of their cloaked parent, which is odd because many of the babies would not be able to do so at that point in their life, but also because the viewer is expected to completely ignore the bizarre figure that is clearly behind the child.

Many uses: The mother helped prop the young infants up for the duration of the shoot, even though many of them were far too young to be able to do that naturally



Real point: Mostly, the mother's presence was just to keep the child calm and still during the sometimes-gruelingly long photo sessions

Parents clearly tried whatever they could to make the portraits come off as natural, but unfortunately, that was hardly the case.

Portrait sessions in the late 1800s 'were challenging for sitters because of the low emulsion sensitivity and consequently lengthy exposure times,' experts at Sewanee University of the South told Digg.

'In the case of children, one stress-reducing device for keeping them still was to cloak mothers and disguise them as a support on or against which the child rested.'

Ducking for cover: Other options included sitting the young infants in proper chairs but then propping them upright from behind with the parent's hands exposed

Cover up: Extra-long child garments were used to help hide the parent's legs and body from the camera

Another one of the gimmicks would be to have the photographer zoom in very closely to have the child take up most of the space of the portrait.

Retronaut shows that ghostmothers were still present in those photos, however, and in one case the mother's hand is seen stroking the child on their side.

The child's garments also provided some cover for the mothers-turned-chairs, as extended trains and skirts on dressing gowns for children were used to over the parent's legs.

Others didn't think ahead and just covered the parent's upper body and left their legs totally exposed.

Lasting images: The portraits clearly meant a lot to the families because it took a good deal of effort for them to be produced

Distracting patterns: Similar bold throws were used in a number of the portraits to help cover the parents without it looking like the Grim Reaper was behind the child

