Frederick Tatham was an intimate friend of William Blake and also frequently visited Samuel Palmer whilst he lived in Shoreham. Their admiration for early renaissance art and their belief in the superiority of ancient over modern humanity, led them to form an artistic brotherhood called `The Ancients' to which Edward Calvert, George Richmond and Francis Oliver Finch also belonged.

Frederick Tatham was both a sculptor and a miniaturist, and on William Blake's death in 1827 he took on Blake's widow as his housekeeper until her death in 1831. After her death he acquired much of Blake's possessions, many of which he allegedly destroyed. This collection has a pair of miniatures by Tatham, of Mr William Williams, a button maker and his wife. Tatham's father, the architect Charles Heathcote Tatham, was himself a friend of Blake and Palmer, and his house in St John's Wood was often visited by artist Charles Heathcote. Tatham's daughter, Julia, eloped with George Richmond in 1830.