Archives Office of Tasmania "convict" photographs by T. J. Nevin 1870s

PUBLIC COLLECTIONS 1870s Tasmanian prisoner mugshots
GOVERNMENT CONTRACTOR photographer T. J. NEVIN
DISPERSAL and SUPPRESSION of archival records

The Archives Office of Tasmania collection
Online until the mid 2000s, the Archives Office of Tasmania (AOT) displayed their collection of paper photocopies of the carte-de-visite photographs of Tasmanian convicts held at the Queen Victoria Museum and Art Gallery (QVMAG). The originals - police mugshots taken in the 1870s - were exhibited at the QVMAG in the 1970s as the work of professional photographer and government contractor Thomas J. Nevin. The term "convicts" gained currency in tourism discourse as interest in Australia's penal heritage gathered momentum in the 20th century. The weekly police gazettes of the 1870s always used the term "prisoner" - not "convict"  - in their reports of crime.  

The webshots (below) of those Archives Office of Tasmania online records were catalogued ca. 1985, captioned "Photograph taken at Port Arthur by Thomas Nevin" (see below) and dated 1874 or earlier. Few in fact were taken at the Port Arthur prison in that year; many were taken over more than a decade in the years 1870s - 1880s. The date and place of the AOT caption reflects the error about Port Arthur as the place where all of these photographs were taken, made by an archivist in the early 1900s, most likely by Edward Searle while working in John Watt Beattie at his "Port Arthur" convictaria museum and studio in Hobart between 1911-1916 where three panels of forty prisoner mugshots were offered for sale, among other convict memorabilia. Similarly, the date "1874" does not reflect actual judicial events in the prisoner's criminal career, i.e. whether he was photographed on remand, sentencing, incarceration or discharge. The photographer attribution to Thomas J. Nevin, however, was and still is correct.

The majority - but not all - of the AOT's collection of 1870s mugshots are b&w paper copies reproduced from J. W. Beattie's collection acquired by the Queen Victoria Museum and Art Gallery from his estate in the 1930s.



See T. J. Nevin's photographs of these prisoners at TROVE (NLA) - and each of the webshots at Flickr or here at https://prisonerpics.blogspot.com/p/archives-office-of-tasmania-2005.html

Or click on each of the three panels below.





Archives Office of Tasmania 2005
Webshots of 1870s Tasmanian prisoners by T. J. Nevin

Police gazette records
The colonial government of Tasmania adopted the practice of taking identification photographs and establishing an Habitual Criminals Register or Rogue's Gallery in 1872 from precedents set by the British Prevention of Crimes Act of 1871, and incoming legislation in NSW and Victoria in 1872. The extant photographs are "mugshots" taken of men who were arrested, arraigned, sentenced, reconvicted and/or discharged during the 1870s and early 1880s in Tasmania. For the most part these prisoners were recidivists, habitual criminals and repeat offenders. Thomas J. Nevin took the majority of these photographs at the Mayor's Court and Municipal Police Office (PO on their criminal record sheets) at the Hobart Town Hall, at the Supreme Court and adjoining Hobart Town Gaol, Campbell Street.

The AOT records (above) were copied from the QVMAG collection in the 1980s, although some originals were acquired in the 1950s from the Radcliffe Museum at Port Arthur via the Department of National Parks which managed the site. The original extant collection of 1870s prisoner mugshots, comprising both uncut prints and prints in carte-de-visite mounts, were salvaged by John Watt Beattie for reproduction and for sale to tourists at his "Port Arthur Museum" which was located at 51 Murray St. Hobart (and not at Port Arthur). Many of these were removed from the prisoner's rap sheet detailing the date and nature of every offense. Others were sourced from records originally held at the Town Hall Municipal Police Office and from records held at the Sheriff's Office, Hobart Gaol. J. W. Beattie bequeathed his large collection to the Launceston Municipal Council which was then acquired by the Queen Victoria Museum and Art Gallery (ca 1930).

The weekly police gazettes detailing the records of the men, their age, appearance and sentencing were titled (until 1884) Tasmania Reports of Crime Information for Police, James Barnard Government Printer. The original photograph - Nevin made at least four from each negative in a single sitting with the prisoner - was pasted to the criminal's rap sheet, recorded and sometimes numbered in the gaol photobooks, utilised for descriptions in the publication of warrants in the weekly police gazettes, displayed in Rogues' Galleries at the central Municipal Police Office, Hobart Town Hall, and circulated to other prisons and regional police stations on the prisoner's discharge.

Here are two examples of Nevin's photographs of prisoners and their records from the police gazettes chosen at random which detail the exact time and place of the photograph:

1. Charles Steventon was convicted of larceny and photographed by T. J. Nevin at the Police Office Hobart on January 4th, 1873.





Charles Steventon
QVMAG Collection: QVM: 1985:P116



POLICE RECORDS



Charles Steventon per ship David Malcolm was discharged as a "pauper" from Port Arthur to Hobart on 27th July 1872,



Last entry: record of Charles Steventon, 71 years old, convicted on 31st December 1873 at the Police Office Hobart for larceny, sentenced to two years. This document lists the names of prisoners sent to Port Arthur after 1871 and returned to the Hobart Gaol. It was tabled in Parliament, 9th June 1873. Read more here: Tasmanian Crime Statistics 1866-1875. On being received back at the Hobart Gaol, Steventon was photographed by Thomas Nevin. His photograph was printed from Nevin's glass negative or reproduced from the print again on discharge in November 1874.



The record of returns at the Hobart Gaol, 4th January 1873. Charles Steventon per ship David Malcolm, brushmaker from Birmingham (UK), his age recorded here as 67 yrs old, was sentenced to 2 years for larceny. His previous conviction was on 12 January 1870.



Charles Steventon per David Malcolm was discharged from Hobart Town on 4th November 1874. Distinguishing marks: an open gun shot wound in right leg. His photograph taken by Thomas Nevin in 1873 would have been reprinted again on this date.

2. Charles Brown, 22 years old, aka William Forster, wanted for absconding, was photographed by Thomas J. Nevin when Charles Brown surrendered himself to the Hobart Gaol and was charged, January 9th, 1874. See this article here about mismatched records.



Charles Brown, 22 years old, born ca. 1852 and therefore not a transported convict, surrendered himself to the Hobart Gaol, 9th January 1874.





Misidentification: this prisoner was Charles Brown not William Forster
QVMAG Collection: QVM: 1985:P94

Extant numbers of 1870s Tasmanian prisoner cdv's
Current estimates at April 2009 of the total number of Tasmanian prisoner photographs still extant in various formats produced from government contractor T. J. Nevin's original glass negatives as prints, as mounted cartes-de-visite, as duplicates or as paper copies in public collections, several of which bear verso T. J. Nevin's colonial warrant with the government printer's Royal Arms seal, are as follows:

  • Archives Office of Tasmania holds 92 copies from the QVMAG collection
  • Archives Office of Tasmania holds 10 originals from the Radcliffe Museum
  • National Library of Australia holds 84 duplicates as mounted cdvs from the QVMAG
  • Queen Victoria Museum and Art Gallery holds 112 original uncut and mounted cdvs
  • Tasmanian Museum and Art Gallery holds 58 mounted cdvs plus unmounted prints, originally borrowed from the QVMAG's Beattie Collection for exhibition at Port Arthur in 1983 (E. Wishart et al).
  • Penitentiary Chapel Historic Site holds 3, one at least attached to criminal record
  • Port Arthur Historic Site holds a few reproduced as tourist postcards
  • The Mitchell Library State Library NSW holds 13 mounted cdvs, some versos with T. J. Nevin's government contract warranty
  • Private collectors have indicated 15 [7 were sold at Leski's Auctions in 2024]

Several of these items are duplicates made contemporaneously by Thomas J. Nevin at the time of photographic capture from his glass negatives; copies were made and/or circulated to other public collections from the QVMAG collection in 1958, 1977, 1982, 1985, 1991 and more recently for online display at the AOT as well as at the TMAG, QVMAG and NLA. As several images of the same man are extant, some with aliases, the actual number of prisoners represented is difficult to determine. More are being discovered in public archives, and a few have been offered for sale at auctions. The archival and curatorial numbers appearing on recto or verso of the cartes-de-visite held in various public collections range from 1 to 316. In some cases, photographs of two different men bear the same number, e.g. the number 3 appears on Moran's carte at the NLA, and on Tuck's carte at the QVMAG and AOT.

DUPLICATES or COPIES?
These nine particular mounted photographs of prisoners now at the AOT (Libraries Tasmania) which were taken by Thomas J. Nevin in the 1870s appear to be duplicates from the sepia originals held in the Beattie collection at the QVMAG. They may have arrived at the AOT as estrays from the Radcliffe Museum at Port Arthur. They had APA citations when found online (2013):



"Alfred Doran, probably Albert Dorman, convict transported per Blenheim. Photograph taken at Port Arthur by Thomas Nevin. LINC Tasmania"



"George Growsett, convict transported per Lady Montague. Photograph taken at Port Arthur by Thomas Nevin. LINC Tasmania"



"James Harrison, convict transported per Rodney. Photograph taken at Port Arthur by Thomas Nevin. LINC Tasmania"



Henry Smith - but unidentified by TAHO
"Convict, transported per Rodney. Photograph taken at Port Arthur by Thomas Nevin. LINC Tasmania"



"James Smith, Convict transported per John Calvin. Photograph taken at Port Arthur by Thomas Nevin. LINC Tasmania"



"Robert West, convict transported per Gilmore. Photograph taken at Port Arthur by Thomas Nevin. LINC Tasmania"



"William Ryan, arrived free per City of Hobart, tried Launceston 1868. Photograph taken at Port Arthur by Thomas Nevin. LINC Tasmania". Read more about William Ryan here.



"Richard Phillips, convict transported per Atlas. Photograph taken at Port Arthur by Thomas Nevin. LINC Tasmania." Read more about Richard Phillips here.

None of these images of Tasmanian prisoners - neither the b&w photocopies nor the copies of the sepia originals which were online at the AOT in 2005 and 2013 respectively - can be found by searching the State Library of Tasmania catalogue or the Archives Office of Tasmania database. According to a statement issued by the AOT director at the time, they were removed sometime after 2010 on the grounds that the paper copies were not original photographs. This rather pretentious excuse at aesthetic value effectively buried valuable historical information for readers searching online for ancestry records etc.

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