A COLLECTION of early photographs has failed to raise the expected figure of more than £95,000 at auction.

Fifteen shots by the Bury photographer Roger Fenton, including some taken in the Crimean War in 1855 when he was the world's first accredited war photographer, went for a total of £84,605 at Sotheby's in London.

The most valuable lot -- a view of a country estate entitled Cedars, Monmouthshire - was alone expected to raise more than £30,000 but it went for £21,510.

The overall total was affected after one photograph entitled Salmon Pool at the Sale Wheel over the River Ribble went unsold.

Dr Juliette Hacking, photography expert at Sotheby's, said: "It is always difficult to predict what prices items are going to attract but the photographs did fetch good prices and we were very pleased."

The sale is well short of the record breaking £278,000 reached at auction last year for a print of Fenton's entitled The Billiard Room, Mentmore.

Fenton was born in Crimblehall, Heap, Bury, in 1819 and became a favourite of Queen Victoria, photographing the Royal Family several times. The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York is planning to stage an exhibition of his prints in 2004.