On the trail of the Cottingley Fairies: Accidental conspiracy and the mystery of the missing negatives

This essay reconsiders the Cottingley Fairies episode by placing the material history of its photographic negatives at the centre of the story. It argues that the transformation of a family joke into a world‑famous phenomenon emerged through an accidental conspiracy shaped not by deliberate deception on the part of Elsie Wright and Frances Griffiths, but by the subsequent manipulation, mislabelling, and disappearance of the original negatives. Drawing on extensive research in the Brotherton Library’s Special Collections, the chapter demonstrates how Edward L. Gardner and Harold Snelling—alongside the more distanced influence of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle—became co‑authors of the myth through their interventions in the photographic record. Snelling’s sophisticated “improvements,” Gardner’s handling and circulation of intermediate plates, and the enduring mystery of the missing Midg camera negatives all contribute to a narrative in which the physical artefacts themselves reshape the cultural meaning of the images. Through a literary‑historical lens, the essay shows how archival absences, altered material evidence, and layers of reproduction complicate notions of authenticity and authority. In doing so, it reframes the Cottingley photographs not simply as fakes, but as palimpsests whose evolving material form reveals how folklore, visual culture, and belief are rewritten through the unstable life of photographic objects.