Tuck & Sons was a business started by Raphael Tuck and his wife in Bishopsgate London, in 1866, initially selling pictures and greeting cards, but eventually specialising in postcards, using various commissioned artists, and these became very popular in the 'postcard boom' of the early 1900s.

During the Blitz, the company headquarters, Raphael House, was totally destroyed including the originals for most of their card series.

The company never fully recovered from this disaster. My packaged set of six local “Oilette” painting cards, issued in 1903, are all very colourful, but there is a considerable amount of ‘artistic license’ here, even allowing for the fact that they depict imaginary scenes from an earlier era.

For example, the Marlow Lock view is all wrong since Lock Island has totally disappeared! Also, the roof on Bisham’s church tower is not as tall as depicted.

The artist for this ‘Thames At Marlow’ set is credited as J.T.Adams.

Some vintage photographic postcards fetch high prices these days, but painted Tuck ones like these can usually be found at reasonable prices.