John Henry Walker
Illustration — Commercial label of Caller Mackerel, Shanks & Smith, Charlottetown, Prince Edward Island John Henry Walker (1831–1899), a pioneer Canadian engraver and illustrator, was from County Antrim in Northern Ireland and as a young boy emigrated in 1842 to Canada with his family, settling in Toronto, Upper Canada. In 1845 he was apprenticed for three years to the engraver Cyrus A. Swett, where he was trained in copper and wood engraving. Walker provided the engravings for catalogues, government reports, advertisements and magazines such as The Canadian Illustrated News, L'Opinion Publique and Le Monde Illustré, and produced the front-cover illustration for his launching of Punch in Canada in 1849.
John Henry Walker
John Henry Walker (1831-1899) · This file is from the Mechanical Curator collection, a set of over 1 million images scanned from out-of-copyright books and released to Flickr Commons by the British Library. View image on Flickr Vie · Public domain
- Born
- 1831 · County Antrim.
- Died
- 1899 · Montreal.
- Nationality
- Canada
- Occupation
- printmaker
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wikidata · Q6238971 · wikipedia · John Henry Walker
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Gallery
Gallery
The magazine was styled on the English Punch and failed when published by Walker as a weekly. His other short-lived humorous periodicals were The Jester, Grinchuckle and Diogenes. He is regarded as a pioneer of political cartooning in Canada and dominated engraving in Montreal from 1845 into the 1890s. His legacy of illustrations provides a rich insight into life in Victorian Canada.
• Illustration — The capture of French Fort Frontenac by the British in 1758 • Illustration — Engraving of a bandsaw 1850–185 • Illustration — Wood engraving of basket phaeton, c. 1870
Documentary record
John Henry Walker (1831 – 1899) was a painter, printmaker, graphic artist, illustrator and caricaturist. The birth of John Henry Walker is recorded in 1831 in Antrim, and the death in 1899.
John Henry Walker, QUEBEC(1876) p103 ST. JOHN'S GATE
John Henry Walker (1831-1899) · This file is from the Mechanical Curator collection, a set of over 1 million images scanned from out-of-copyright books and released to Flickr Commons by the British Library. View image on Flickr Vie
John Henry Walker, QUEBEC(1876) p105 ST. LOUIS GATE
John Henry Walker (1831-1899) · This file is from the Mechanical Curator collection, a set of over 1 million images scanned from out-of-copyright books and released to Flickr Commons by the British Library. View image on Flickr Vie
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County Antrim.
Birth place
Montreal.
Death place
Primary material
Documents and archives
authority record
- Wikidata, structured authority record Q6238971: John Henry Walker
General reference · Wikidata
reference work
- “John Henry Walker”, English Wikipedia, consulted as further reading
Reputable secondary · Wikipedia
Text attribution
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Part of the biographical narrative on this page reuses licensed material. Its origin, revision and licence are recorded here.
The biographical narrative on this page is based on the Wikipedia article John Henry Walker, revision 1364725736 (EN edition), by its contributors. VALÉORINE has edited that text and built its own documentary record around it. The reused material is available under CC BY-SA 4.0, and this page's reuse of it is offered under the same licence. Everything else on this page — the chronology, the holdings, the evidence, the plates and the connections — is VALÉORINE's own record. Sources and licences.
Notes from the source article
Cited by Wikipedia
Notes from the source article
These works are cited by the source article, in its own numbering. They are recorded as its citations, not as sources VALÉORINE has verified.
- 1.Yves Chevrefils. John Henry Walker, artisan-graveur. Journal of Canadian Art History. 1985. 178-225.
- 2.Walker, John Henry - Répertoire du patrimoine culturel du Québec. www.patrimoine-culturel.gouv.qc.ca.
- 3.McCord Museum.
- 4.Cartoons (1850-1900) | Thematic Tours | Musée McCord Museum. Mccord-museum.qc.ca. 2006-08-09.
- 5.Paysages urbains montréalais : documenter la collection de gravures de John Henry Walker Laboratoire d'histoire et de patrimoine de Montréal UQAM. Laboratoire d'histoire et de patrimoine de Montréal.
References
Citations
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authority record
Secondary witnessreference work
Secondary witness
The Encyclopedia exists whether or not anything is for sale. Corrections are recorded rather than overwritten, and every version of this record is kept. Published 16 August 2026.
Elsewhere in Prints
4,138 published records in this field, each with its sources named.
- John Hamilton MortimerEngraver
- John Henry BuffordEngraver
- John Henry Le KeuxEngraver
- John Henry RobinsonEngraver
- John HoppnerEngraver
- John HorsburghEngraver
- John Howard BensonEngraver
- John HoylandEngraver
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