Two albums containing prints collected by Herbert Howel Davies (HHD), Principal of the Colvin Taluqdars School, Lucknow. It includes a number of professional photographs of places visited by HHD (notably Lucknow, Delhi, Benares, and Agra) and also many smaller amateur prints, presumably taken by him, of his life at the school and his travels, particularly to Kashmir. Y3022Q/52-60 are non-Indian photographs, presumably taken on leave.

Sir Auckland Colvin (1838-1908) was appointed Lieutenant Governor of the North West Provinces and Chief Commissioner of Oudh in 1887. At his urging, the taluqdars, a group of estate holders in Oudh whose status had been recognised under British Rule, but who were regarded as needing improved education, set up a committee to raise funds for a school. In 1880 Colvin laid the foundation stone, on a plot donated by the Government, and the school began classes two years later. It was named the Colvin Taluqdars School, and its first Principal was Henry George Impey Siddons, the posthumous child of a Captain in the Indian Army, who graduated at Oxford and returned to India to teach. From 1875 to 1884 he had been first headmaster, then Principal, of the MAO College, Aligarh, subsequently holding other teaching posts in India. His successor at the Colvin School was HHD. A copy of HHD's obituary is held within Y302Q.