Dictionary of National Biography, 1912 supplement/Jackson, Mason
JACKSON, MASON (1819–1903), wood-engraver, was born of humble parentage at Ovingham, Northumberland, on 25 May 1819. He came to London at the age of eleven to reside with his elder brother, John Jackson [q. v.], joint author with William Andrew Chatto of the 'Treatise on Wood Engraving' (1839). Mason received from his brother his first lessons in wood-engraving. By 1836 he was sufficiently advanced to take part in the engraving of Richard Seymour's design for the green wrapper of the monthly parts of 'Pickwick Papers'. Between 1850 and 1860 Jackson made himself a name by his wood-engravings for the Art Union of London; by his engraved illustrations to Knight's Shakespeare (1851–2), Walton's 'Compleat Angler' (1856), and the 'Arabian Nights' (1859); and by his work in the 'Illustrated London News'. On the death of Herbert Ingram [q. v.] in 1860 Jackson joined the staff of the 'Illustrated London News' as art editor, a position which he filled with great ability till his retirement some thirty years later. Like his brother, Mason Jackson took a literary and historical as well as a practical interest in his profession. His book 'The Pictorial Press : its Origin and Progress' (1885) is a valuable work, tracing the rise and progress of illustrated journalism from its crudest beginnings to its modern development. He died in London on 28 Dec. 1903, and was buried in Brompton cemetery.
Jackson married Lucy Tippetts on 16 July 1864, and had two sons and a daughter. His daughter married Professor Sir Walter Raleigh in July 1890.
His elder son, Arthur Mason Jackson (1866-1909), was educated at Westminster School and Brasenose College, Oxford, and entered the Indian Civil Service in 1887. After being collector at Nasik for two years he was murdered there by a young Brahmin on 21 Dec. 1909, on the eve of his departure to take over the duties of collector at Bombay. During his service in India he devoted his great talents especially to the study of Sanskrit and the vernaculars, and was recognised as one of the best Oriental scholars of his day.
[The Times, 2 Jan. 1904 and 23 Dec. 1909; Illustrated London News, 2 Jan. 1904; private information.]