Hmmm...I dunno - the guy was an undertaker and the horse collapsed and died and now he's waiting for the knacker to come take it away? Doesn't look like it was much of an event at any rate - there is only one person in the background who seems interested, and I bet he was more interested in the photographer than the guy sitting on the dead horse!
Apparently the fact that he was wearing a top hat doesn't have as much significance as it might today (it is now regarded as formal attire):
QUOTE
The top hat first began to appear in England during the 1800s, about the same time as the bowler. It was introduced and first worn in public by a haberdasher named John Hetherington as a variation on the riding hat which was covered with silk and had a lower and wider brim. According to a newspaper at the time, "several women fainted, children screamed, dogs yelped, and an errand boy's arm was broken when he was trampled by the mob." He was hauled into court for the crime of wearing "a tall structure having a shining luster calculated to frighten timid people."
By 1850 Prince Albert began wearing top hats, the first prominent social figure to do so, and the top hat soon became the last word in style. They weren't worn only for formal occasions, but also for business and pleasure. The common nickname "stovepipe" described both its shape and color and doubtless arose as a result of the developing industrial age. Lord Ribblesdale is immortalized in a 1902 portrait by John Singer Sargent wearing a top hat with a now-characteristic tilt, slightly forward and to the side.
(
http://everything2.com)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Top_hat
