PHOTOGRAPHS of an Accrington mill owner's daughter-in-law who became the inspiration for the Alice in Wonderland stories have been banned from leaving the country.

For 18 years before her wedding to Jonathan Hargreaves' son Reginald, young Alice Liddell became the inspiration for Lewis Carroll's Alice in Wonderland stories.

A set of rare photographs of the little girl, taken by the children's author himself, were sold to collectors from the US for about £600,000 at auction in June last year. They had been part of a private collection from Alice's family estate which were sold along with other Lewis Carroll memorabilia at auctioneers Sotheby's in London.

But a temporary export ban was imposed on the photographs by the Government in November, after campaigners fought to keep the images in Britain because of their special place in history and this has now been extended until May.

Russell Roberts, a curator at the National Museum of Photography, Film and Television (NMPFT) in Bradford, said that the ban had been extended by the Department for Culture, Media and Sport.

He said: "These were photographs that Carroll gave to Alice and her family as a token of gratitude for her inspirational character and we decided they were of outstanding national importance.

"What we are talking about is securing for the country, through national museums, some of Carroll's most important work."

Mr Roberts said a consortium, including the NMPFT, the National Portrait Gallery, Victoria and Albert Museum and Museum of Oxford, were now trying to raise £600,000 to re-purchase the photographs.

If successful, the collection of about a dozen albumen prints would be displayed at both the NMPFT and the National Portrait Gallery. Other museums would also be offered the photographs on a temporary loan basis.

Mr Roberts added: "We have got some donations so far, but we still have a long way to go. We've got a deferral until May, so that extra few months is extremely helpful."

Carroll was inspired to write what became an internationally-renowned classic children's book after meeting Alice and her two sisters on a river expedition in 1862.

She and her sisters pestered Carroll, whose real name was Charles Lutwidge Dodgeson,to tell them a story. He began a tale about Alice's adventures down a rabbit hole which he wrote down for her and illustrated in a leather booklet as a Christmas present two years later.

Also featured among the 158 sale items at Sotheby's was Alice and Reginald's photograph album for 1905-07, which included a photograph of Oak Hill, the Hargreaves' original family home.

Alice is understood to have stayed at Oak Hill Mansion with her husband before they moved to the New Forest, but she kept in touch with the author who immortalised her.