The first color photographs, where the colors are part of the chemical process and not instead added manually later by ink or paint, were devised by an upstate New York Baptist minister named Levi Hill around 1850. For years, Hill refused to disclose the formula for his photos, and for years many persons cried fraud and stated that Hill's images were simply black and white pictures where the pigments had been applied later by hand. Finally, in 1856, Hill sold advance subscriptions to his book describing his recipe for color photographs for the princely sum of $25 (over $675 in today's dollars). The book proved to be too rambling and incoherent for most readers to be able to duplicate the process and did little to erase the suspicions that Hill's pictures (known as "Hillotypes") were just hand-colored photos.
In 1981, Joseph Boudreau was able to decipher the tome adequately to create color photos resulting solely from a chemical process--especially for certain pigments such as red, green, blue, magenta, orange, and yellow. However, the range of colors was limited, and most faded out rather quickly when the photos were displayed in normal light.
Tests done by the Smithsonian's National Museum of American History in 2007 on numerous original Hillotypes revealed that most of the colors on them other than red and blue had been added by hand (presumably by Hill). In other words, Hill was a fraud--just not a complete one. Despite the fake coloration of some of the hues, he can still be credited with developing (so to speak) the first color photograph.
For more information on Rev. Hill's colorful invention, see this article on the Smithsonian website.
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