Thomas J. Nevin | Tasmanian Photographer

Prisoner John F. MORRIS 1875

Murder of his wife's seducer
American legal precedent

NLA Catalogue (incorrect information)
nla.pic-an24612762 PIC P1029/36 LOC Album 935
John F. Morris, per P. [i.e. Pestonjee] Bomanjee 2, taken at Port Arthur, 1874
1 photograph on carte-de-visite mount : albumen ; 9.3 x 5.6 cm.

TRANSPORTATION RECORD: John F. MORRIS
Morris, John Frederick
Record Type: Convicts
Property: Port Arthur Penal Station
Departure date: 20 Sep 1848
Departure port: Dublin
Ship: Pestongee Bomangee (3)
Place of origin: Antrim
Origin location: Latitude and Longitude
Voyage number: 305
Remarks: Transported as John Morrison
Police number: 21306
Index number: 50861
Record ID: NAME_INDEXES:1420329
Conduct Record: CON33/1/92
Archives Office Tasmania: https://libraries.tas.gov.au/Record/NamesIndex/1420439

PRESS REPORTS: John F. MORRIS
In April 1861 John Morris shot dead a man called John Glann who seduced his wife and paraded her in the streets of New Norfolk. He was arrested and sentenced to life in prison. He absconded from the Port Arthur prison with three others, and was apprehended in October 1861.

Hobart Town Advertiser : Weekly Edt. (Tas. : 1859 - 1865), Saturday 20 April 1861, page 2
Source: https://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article264717617

TRANSCRIPT

THE UNFORTUNATE MAN MORRIS.
To the Editor of the Advertiser.
SIR.-You will oblige me by your inserting in your journal the following case tried in. merica about twelve months ago, in every particular the same as the case of the unhappy man John Morris, under sentence of Death for the murder of John Glann. There were two members of the bar, and intimate friends, one married. The other," unmarried, seduces the wife of his friend. " The husband in return for his treachery, waits for the seducer, and in one of the public streets of America shoots him dead. He is apprehended, tried by a jury of his own countrymen, and after a trial of two or three days is Acquitted. In the case of Morris he seducer Glann was not content after seducing the wife of Morris, but openly paraded the wife and children in the public streets of New Norfolk repeatedly in sight of the unfortunate man; and up to within half an hour of the time Glann was shot he was driving the wife and family in a chaise cart, and within a mile where the deed was committed, and in my opinion, in sight of the unfortunate man Morris. I am no advocate in defending a murderer, but from the provocations and the ruin of wife and family, and the man's happiness, I think the Gentlemen of the Executive Council will pause before they consign the unhappy man to an ignominious death.
I am. Sir,
Your obedient servant,
A. SMITH
New Norfolk, 20th April, 1861.

John F. Morris absconded with three other prisoners from the prison at Port Arthur on 20 September. They were apprehended on 5 October 1861.

TRANSCRIPT

THE PORT ARTHUR ABSCONDERS.
The four escaped convicts, George Fisher, John F. Morris, Daniel Ennis, and John S. Blaxland, who have been for some time past at large on the Peninsula, (viz., since the 20th ultimo) have been apprehended by the Port Arthur police near the Eagle Hawk Neck.

Mercury (Hobart, Tas.), Saturday 5 October 1861, page 2
Source: https://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article8801482

POLICE RECORDS: John F. MORRIS

John F. Morris, transported on Pestongee Bomangee (3) on the 20 September 1848, was tried at Supreme Court Hobart 9 April 1861 for murder, sentenced to life in prison. He was 48 years old, 5 feet 8 ins tall when he was photographed by government contractor Thomas J. Nevin on discharge from the Municipal Police Office, Hobart Town Hall, 28 April, 1875, the residue of his sentence remitted.

RELATED POSTS at main weblog

Prisoner James WYNNE [Wynn] 1875

The TMAG copy
This copy from T. J. Nevin's original glass negative was numbered "120" during removal from the QVMAG collection, Launceston in 1983 for display at the Port Arthur Heritage site for the PA Development Project. It was not returned to the QVMAG, deposited instead at the TMAG, Hobart. The phrase and date "Taken at Port Arthur 1874" was added verso in the early 1900s for exhibition and sale at John Watt Beattie's "Port Arthur Museum", 51 Murray St. Hobart,

Prisoner WYNNE, James
TMAG Ref: Q15592
Photographer: Thomas J. Nevin, 1875

The NLA copy

NLA Catalogue
Part of collection: Convict portraits, Port Arthur, 1874.
Gunson Collection file 203/7/54.
Title from inscription on reverse of mount.
Inscription: "39"--On reverse.
Condition: Foxing.
Online: https://nla.gov.au/nla.obj-142914919
Subject:Wynne, James -- Portraits

POLICE RECORDS: James Wynn

James Wynne per Barossa 2, known to police as WYNN, was sentenced to five years at the Supreme Court Launceston on 26 March 1871 for housebreaking and robbery. He was photographed on discharge at the Municipal Police Office, Hobart Town Hall by government contractor T. J. Nevin in the week of 3 March 1875. He was 57 yrs old, 5 ft 9 ins tall, "Free in servitude" (FS).

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IN HIS OWN WORDS...

"T. J. NEVIN
PHOTOGRAPHIC ARTIST,
Returns his sincere thanks to his friends and the public for past favours, and having made a considerable Reduction in his Prices to suit the times, he solicits a continuance of their patronage, and invites attention to his circulars, showing particulars of the small cost for a first-class faithful Likeness.
140 ELIZABETH-STREET"
Hobart Mercury, 1st February 1873

“I hope that you have not got it in your mind that I am implicated with the ghost“.
Hobart Mercury, 4 December 1880

"Defendant said that he was the father of a large number of children, and did not know which one was referred to. (Laughter.)"
Hobart Mercury, 11 August 1886

"Mr. Thos Nevin was under the impression that the police should be under stricter supervision."
Hobart Mercury, 19 July 1888.

BIOGRAPHY: professional photographer Thomas James Nevin snr (1842-1923) produced large numbers of stereographs and cartes-de-visite within his commercial practice, and prisoner identification photographs on government contract. His career spanned nearly three decades, from the early 1860s to the late 1880s. He was one of the first photographers to work with the police in Australia, along with Charles Nettleton (Victoria) and Frazer Crawford (South Australia). His Tasmanian prisoner mugshots are among the earliest to survive in public collections, viz. the Queen Victoria Museum and Art Gallery, Launceston; the Tasmanian Museum and Art Gallery, Hobart; the Tasmanian Heritage and Archives Office, Hobart; the Port Arthur Historic Site, Tasman Peninsula; the National Library of Australia, Canberra; and the Mitchell Library, State Library of NSW, Sydney. Thomas J. Nevin's stereographs and portraits are held in public and private collections in Australia, New Zealand, the USA, the United Kingdom, the Netherlands, Denmark, France and Switzerland.

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Important Notices

INDIGENOUS NOTICE:
lutruwita/Tasmania/Van Diemen's Land (loo-tru-wee-ta) always was, always will be Aboriginal land.

This weblog pays respect to the ancestors and elders past, present, and emerging of the first Australian peoples and acknowledges their continued connection to land, sea and culture as the traditional custodians of this country.

Irish-born Thomas J. Nevin would have been keenly aware that the residence and photographic studio he occupied at No's 138-140 Elizabeth St. Hobart in the 1870s were built on the traditional lands, nipaluna of the palawa people. It is no small irony that today, the very same property, which is renumbered as No. 198 Elizabeth St. Hobart and is occupied by the Tasmanian Aboriginal Centre, has returned to its traditional owners.

Looking east from the corner of Patrick St., the Royal Standard Hotel, 142 Elizabeth St. then T. J. Nevin’s studio and residence, 140-138 Elizabeth St. Hobart, 1870s

We also acknowledge the Gadigal people of the Eora nation as the traditional custodians of the City of Sydney, and the Ngunnawal and Ngambri peoples, the traditional custodians of the Kamberri/Canberra region on whose lands this site is maintained.

PLEASE NOTE: images on this weblog represent deceased people, including Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people. Viewing such images may cause sadness and distress.

DISCLAIMER: We have not voluntarily contributed to any publication which supports the misattribution of T. J. Nevin's prisoner/convict photographs (300+ extant) to the non-photographer A. H. Boyd, nor do we condone any attempts by public institutions or private individuals to co-opt the work on these Thomas J. Nevin weblogs and associated sites to apply the misattribution.

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Anthony Trollope at Port Arthur

Thomas Nevin's VIP commission 1872

VISIT TO PORT ARTHUR.- Mr. Trollope and the Hon. Howard Spensly, Esq., Solicitor-General of Victoria, accompanied the Hon. the Premier, J.M. Wilson, Esq., and the Hon. the Attorney-General, W.R. Giblin, Esq., embarked in the Government schooner late last night, some time after Mr. Trollope had concluded his lecture on "Modern Fiction, as a recreation for young people," and left for Port Arthur. Their visit to the Peninsula will be a very hurried one, and will afford them only scant opportunity of inspecting the penal establishment, it being the intention of Messrs. Trollope and Spensly to leave Hobart Town for the North, en route for Victoria in a few days ...

Source: The Mercury 2 February 1872