John Harris and his family

A carte-de-visite showing the diminutive Welsh tailor John Harris (sometimes Harries) with his wife Margaret and seven of their children. The image has been manipulated in several ways to ensure that Harris appears to be the smallest person in the group. Each member of the family has been photographed separately and the resulting portraits have been collaged together. Furthermore, the daughter on the far right has lost her feet and is perched atop a strange black plinth; this has been done to disguise the fact that she’s roughly the same height as her father.

The photograph was entered at Stationers' Hall on 12 May 1870 as part of the copyright process, along with another portrait without all the children. The author of the works was apparently one John Richards of Llanarth in Cardiganshire, and according to the form, John Harris was a party to the agreement, so presumably he benefitted financially from all sales. In fact, his obituary tells us as much. ‘Many years ago he made tours through Glamorganshire and other counties, accompanied by his wife and children, and he was able to turn his journeyings to good account by selling photographs of the group.’

The family appear in plenty of official sources, although the spelling of their surname fluctuates between Harris and Harries. Successive censuses tell us that Mr Harris was a tailor by profession and that in later life Mrs Harris was a ‘charwoman.’ When he died in 1893 the following obituary appeared in a weekly Welsh newspaper; the ellipses in square brackets are the sentence already quoted.

‘DEATH OF “TEILWR BACH DIHEWID” — John Harries, tailor, Feillionen, who was generally known by the name given above, died on Friday, January 6th, aged seventy-eight years. The funeral took place on Tuesday at Dihewid. The Rev. T. Gwilym Evans officiated. He was remarkable for his diminutive stature. This was exhibited to the greatest advantage by means of contrast, for his wife, who survives him, is a corpulent woman 5 feet 5 inches high and weights 193 lbs. John Harries was only 3 feet 8 1/2 inches in height, and weighed sixty-five pounds. He had nine children, eight of them now alive, and they are full sized and some of them are tall men and women. […] Commercial travellers will remember his sister, who was a servant at the Feather’s Hotel for many years. She died about twenty-five years ago. She was only half an inch taller than her brother. It is said that the brother and sister often resisted some tempting offers from showmen to become objects of exhibition. They were the children of Simon Harry Trawsgoed, Dihewid, and both parents and children were at one time members of the Neuaddlwyd Congregational Church under the pastorate of Dr Phillips’ (Cambrian News, 13 January 1893).

His Welsh soubriquet 'Teilwr Bach Dihewid’ translates as 'small tailor [from] Dihewid.’