Completed with Thanks - TLC for a very old one - what is she a copy of?

[tommyfromri]

one from me..., Tommy

[Tony Freeman]

Another version :-)

[Tony Freeman]

Another version ... slightly less rich colour :-)

[Treetotal]

Hi Rapunzel...One from me too.
Carol

[Treetotal]

...and a warmer version.
Carol

[Rapunzel]

Thanks to everyone for your interest and the different restores - all appreciated.
Sorry China and Jim - a typo - she died in 1873 not 1837  . Thank you for saying it is probably a copy of an ambrotype. And as usual both of you have dated this copy spot on.

Regarding illness: I have no details of any illnesses she may have had. Gadget's comments could be right.
She died 5 days after giving birth to her third child, a daughter. Emma Jnr. It's a really tragic story. The midwife used water from the river to wash her and also gave her some to drink. She died of cholera and was the first of many cholera victims in the town. There's no mention of what, if anything, happened to the midwife. Baby Emma lived, became a teacher, never married and died aged 93. She lived in East Berlin, DDR.

Rapunzel 

[chinakay]

Well, what a tragic story. So many stories like it, too

So this would be a memorial photo, as it's definitely after about 1875. There may not have been a photo of her as an older woman, but I applaud the choice of this one...doesn't she have a lovely face.

Baby Emma would have had a tough life in Berlin. First War with horrible privations, the rise of the Third Reich, the bombing, the blockade, the Wall. She died at the height of the Cold War. She saw some history, and that's a fact

Cheers,
China