Welcome to Android Central! Are you talking about the Galaxy Zoom, or some other Samsung device? How were you uploading the photos--were you using the Google Photos Auto Backup feature, or the Google Drive app?
During the upload process, were you checking to make sure you had a good connection over mobile data or wi-fi? Is it possible the phone was waiting for a wi-fi connection before it commenced the upload?
If you physically deleted the folder of photos on your device before they got uploaded to the cloud, then I'm afraid they're gone. Use the My Files app to look in the /DCIM/Camera directory (assuming you took the photos using the phone's Camera app). Are there any files there?