BLUE INK BORDERS, studio STAMPS and CAPTIONS on printed photographs
William LEGRAND bookseller and conchologist
Mid-1860s: a very rare New Town stamp
Untitled, and held at the Tasmanian Museum and Art Gallery, this example by Thomas J. Nevin of a popular and much photographed vista of the Queen's Orphan School and St John's Church, New Town Tasmania, could be titled "Long shadow with guard at the entrance to St John's Avenue, New Town". Its uniqueness as an artefact is the very rare studio stamp on the verso. This is the only known extant example of Thomas Nevin's earliest photography which bears the design and the spelling of his name with an "s" - "Thomas Nevin+s New Town Tasmania" - set against a ribbon in three flat loops, enfolding a flowering plant, and printed in bright blue ink.
Verso of "Long shadow with guard at the entrance to St John’s Avenue, New Town"
TMAG Collection Ref: Q1990.22.4
Thomas Nevin was barely out of his teens when he took this photograph, still a bachelor, and living with his parents in the house built by his father John Nevin snr at Ancanthe next to the Lady Franklin Museum at Kangaroo Valley (now Lenah Valley, New Town Tasmania.) It is entirely possible that Thomas Nevin's early training and first photographic equipment prior to 1865 was obtained from photographer Douglas Kilburn's declining interest as his political aspirations took precedence. It was through Kilburn's neighbour in Davey Street, Hobart, merchant mariner Captain Edward Goldsmith (1804-1869), that Thomas J. Nevin met his future wife Elizabeth Rachel Day, Captain Goldsmith's niece and elder daughter of his sometime navigator and brother-in-law, Captain James Day (1806-1882).
The wording on this unique stamp is typical of commercial branding; the prospective client would know from common speech that "Photographic Studio" are the missing words, and no generic apostrophe denoting possession was necessary or even grammatically logical because of the omission, viz. Nevin's (? what?). Comparative usage today goes unnoticed, eg. Myers, Woolworths, Coles, and Harrods, are the founding family surnames of large retailers where both the apostrophe before the "s" and the thing of possession have been dropped. The American department store, Macy's is a notable exception.
The stamp was devised around 1863-1865 at Thomas Nevin's New Town studio prior to his acquisition of Alfred Bock's stock, studio and glass house at 140 Elizabeth St. Hobart Town in 1865 and prior to his partnership with Robert Smith 1867-68. The more usual New Town stamp which Nevin printed verso on the dozens of stereographs taken during his partnership with Samuel Clifford - and continued to use until ca. 1888 - was much less decorative than this one (see below).
"Long shadow with guard at the entrance to St John’s Avenue, New Town"
TMAG Collection Ref: Q1990.22.4 (not online)
Thomas Nevin took this photograph in the early evening of a summer's day when the shadows were long and the watch house at the entrance to the avenue was manned by at least two constables, given there are two canvas stools outside the porch on the right. The figure sitting against the perimeter fence may have been a guard, or even Nevin's assistant, or quite possibly his younger brother Jack Nevin, who was both his assistant and a constable, Constable John (W. J.) Nevin. The original plans for these two sandstone watch houses included a separate reception room each for men and women plus three small cells in one, and in the other, three rooms for constables. Watch houses on the busy New Town road (the main road leading to the north of the island) were considered a necessary police measure by the 1840s.These lodges were constructed in 1841, the church and schools were built in 1834-35 (TAHO, CSO 5/1/283/7452). The striations across the road at the entrance in this image could be the result of carriage wheels, or chemicals used in the printing process.
Early 1870s: the most common stamp in blue ink
When professional photographer Alfred Bock (1835 -1920) was declared insolvent and departed Hobart, Tasmania in August 1865, his junior partner Thomas J. Nevin (182-1923) acquired at auction the lease of the studio advertised as The City Photographic Establishment, 140 Elizabeth Street Hobart Town, rented from Abraham E. Biggs snr of Victoria. He also acquired Bock's glass house and darkroom, glass negatives, frames, mounts, cards and inks, camera equipment, backsheets and furniture. Thomas Nevin continued to use Alfred Bock's most common verso studio stamp design for another decade, altering it only minimally for his commercial studio portraiture, although he used at least six other designs for various formats and clients, including his Royal Arms colonial warrant studio stamp for commissions with the Hobart City Council and Municipal Police Office.
Alfred Bock used a blue ink rather than black imprinting his stamp verso in this portrait of a teenage girl with bare shoulders and ringlets, possibly one of the last photographs he produced in Hobart.
Girl with bare shoulders and ringlets
Photographer: Alfred Bock ca. 1865
Copyright © KLW NFC Imprint Private Collection 2013 ARR
For some time after Bock's departure in 1865, Thomas Nevin was using the same supply of blue ink on the same design as Bock's with just a minimal alteration to include Bock's name - "T. Nevin Late A. Bock" - enclosed by a belt - the belt being a popular and universal design of the period. The shade of blue ink used to stamp verso this portrait of a seated woman (below) is from the same stock as Bock's (above), with the addition of a slight tinge of red on the kangaroo.
Carte-de-visite portrait in oval mount of an unidentified woman wearing a black dress with white collar
Photographer Thomas Nevin ca. 1866-7
Copyright © KLW NFC Imprint Private Collection 2013 ARR
Carte-de-visite of reclining baby with blue tinting on cushion behind each shoulder of the dress
Verso stamped in blue ink "T. Nevin late A. Bock..."
Scans submitted here courtesy of private collector Liam Peters, December 2010.
Copyright © The Liam Peters Collection 2010 ARR
Alfred Bock and Thomas J. Nevin: blue ink studio stamps 1860s-1870s
These cdv's stamped verso in paler blue ink can be dated from the late 1860s to early 1870s. From ca. 1871 onwards, this same commercial studio back mark used by Nevin was printed exclusively in black ink. For more examples, see this collection of Nevin's portraits held at the National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne donated by John McPhee.
Late 1860s: album prints
By the time Thomas Nevin printed this single large photograph of the River Derwent from his 1860s double print stereograph (below), the blue ink was practically spent. The lettering is large, pale, and barely legible. The stereograph was printed with a blind stamp impress (no ink).
Title: River Derwent above New Norfolk
Description: 1 photographic print
Format: Photograph
ADRI: PH1-1-24A
Source: Archives Office of Tasmania
TMAG Collection Ref: Q1994.56.21
MEDIUM: sepia stereoscope salt paper print ,
MAKER: T Nevin [Artist];
DATE: 1870s
DESCRIPTION : Scene near New Norfolk ?
INSCRIPTIONS & MARKS: Impressed on front: T Nevin/ photo
1872: the rare label
The square royal blue label with T. Nevin's modified design of Alfred Bock's stamp from the mid-1860s and the wording in gold lettering, framed on a cartouche within gold curlicues, is unique to this item, not (yet) seen on the verso of any of his other photographs. Similar wording appeared on Thomas Nevin's most common commercial stamp from 1867 with and without Bock's name but always with the addition of a kangaroo sitting atop the Latin motto "Ad Altiora". Here, Bock's name is still included within the design although Nevin acquired Bock's studio five years earlier, in 1867: "T. Nevin late A. Bock" encircled by a buckled belt stating the firm's name within the strap, "City Photographic Establishment". The address "140 Elizabeth Street Hobarton" appears below the belt buckle and inside the badge motif.
The Colonists' Trip to Adventure Bay
VIPs on board The City of Hobart, 31st January 1872
Stereograph in buff arched mount by Thomas J. Nevin
Private Collection KLW NFC Group copyright © KLW NFC Imprint 2015
From left to right:
Sir John O'Shanassy (seated), excursion organiser and solicitor John Woodcock Graves jnr, Captain John Clinch, the Hon. Alfred Kennerley and the Hon. James Erskine Calder (seated). Standing behind Captain Clinch and Alfred Kennerley is barrister R. Byron Miller.
Verso: The Colonists' Trip to Adventure Bay
VIPs on board The City of Hobart, 31st January 1872
Stereograph in buff arched mount by Thomas J. Nevin
Private Collection KLW NFC Group copyright © KLW NFC Imprint 2015
The name "Graves" with a half-scroll underneath in black ink at lower left on the verso was most likely written by Thomas Nevin himself as a reminder of the client's name for the order. The handwriting is similar to his signatures on the birth registrations of his children in the 1870s.
The pencilled inscription "On board City of Hobart, Cap Clinch, Visitors Trip Jay 1872" and the deduction of the years "1947-1872=75 ago" was written by Jean Porthouse Graves, descendant of the Graves and Miller families, who wrote "My Father" above the right hand frame on the front of the stereograph and a partial arrow pointing to John Woodcock Graves jnr. She had pasted this photograph, and others taken by Thomas J. Nevin of the same group, into a family album (acquired by the KLW NFC Group & Private Collections in 2015 from DSFB, Melbourne).
Late 1870s: the blue border mount
Thomas J. Nevin took this particular photograph of his younger brother Jack, Constable John (William John) Nevin (1851-1891) in a studio setting in the late 1870s. John Nevin sat posed in his street clothes - bow tie, jacket and hat - with right leg resting over left knee. Nevin framed the print within a blue ink border, which distinguishes this photograph - and the one below of the conchologist and bookseller William Legrand which is also framed within a blue ink border - from inks and colours used by other photographers in his cohort of photographers. Alfred Winter, for example, invariably used a red or brown border to frame both studio portraits and landscapes.
Constable John Nevin, brother of Thomas J, Nevin
Known to the family as Jack Nevin
Photographer Thomas J. Nevin ca. late 1870s. Verso blank.
Copyright © KLW NFC Imprint Private Collection 2010.
Thomas Nevin used a crossed blue border on his Hobart Gaol photograph of Edward Wallace taken in 1874 (Mitchell Library, SLNSW (PXB 274) and sepia borders to frame his later carte-de-visite portraits in oval mounts of prisoners ca. 1878, such as those full frontal photographs held at the Mitchell Library State Library of NSW, Series PXB 274, eg, No. 9, photo of Patrick Lamb, to match a dark mount or a dark background behind the sitter. The blue colour used by Nevin to frame his brother's portrait (above) was a darker, deeper navy than the bright, lighter blue he used on his verso studio stamp soon after taking over Alfred Bock's studio from 1865, and that same bright blue colour, most noticeably similar in the photo of the baby (above) was used to frame this mounted carte-de-visite portrait studio portrait (below) of William Legrand, suggesting that the photograph was taken by Thomas J. Nevin, but equally, it may be one of several different cdv mounts used and shared with his friend and colleague, Samuel Clifford, from the late 1860s-early 1870s.
The William Legrand portrait
Similarities to Nevin's work include the semi-turned pose with the subject's gaze averted on a downward diagonal sightline, typically found in Nevin's earlier 1872-1875 mugshots of prisoners (QVMAG, TMAG, SLNSW and NLA Collections) and in several of his immediate family. Important too were social and cultural affiliations factors within Legrand's circle of clients and acquaintances due to Thomas' father John Nevin's post-military career as both poet and journalist. John Nevin's poem, published in 1868, titled "My Cottage in the Wilderness", is also held at the State Library of NSW in the David Scott Mitchell Collection, Ref: DSM/A821/P20. The DSM Collections date from ca 1907.
What was the occasion, then, for William Legrand to request this type of portrait for himself? Several key dates in his life and in the life of the colony may have prompted him to dress formally, perhaps even buy a new stiff silk vest, seek out a barber for a hair cut, and seek out the photographer, all in a bit of a hurry so it seems, judging by the unsmoothed lapel and bunched-up vest.
William Legrand may have needed a carte-de-visite for simply no other reason than to present himself at an important function, such as H.R.H Prince Alfred's visit to Hobart in 1868. Thomas Nevin photographed children for the visit operating as the firm of Nevin & Smith with partner Robert Smith until Smith's departure to NSW in 1868. A request for a photograph may have come from Legrand's Sydney publishers - the engravers for the shell drawings (Mercury, 23 November 1870) which featured in his preliminary self-published monograph, Collections for a Monograph of Tasmanian Land Shells, 1871. Then again, Mr Legrand may have been included on a list of notable citizens whose portraits were submitted to various intercolonial and international exhibitions. Tasmanian photographers exhibited at the London International Exhibition of 1873 and the Philadelphia Centennial Exhibition of 1875.
An original mounted carte-de-visite of Tasmanian bookseller and conchologist William Legrand
Unattributed, possibly Samuel Clifford or Thomas J. Nevin ca. 1870
Printed on a mount within a bright blue border, stamped on recto with the SLNSW accession stamp.
Verso blank. See references below.
Emailed Notes from the State Library of NSW:
"The carte of Mr Legrand at P1/Legrand has no photographer's identification, just the handwritten inscription Mr W Legrand Tasmania on verso and in a later hand Conchologist and Bookseller."
Scan of M. legrand's image sourced online from Joan Frances Holloway (2010),William Legrand: A Study
Unpublished PhD thesis, School of English, Media Studies and Art History, The University of Queensland.
"Page 283: Figure 9. William Legrand, n.d., photograph. Mitchell Library, State Library of New South Wales.P1/W." online 2011. Correspondence with author gratefully acknowledged.
The provenance of this photograph is not clearly documented by the State Library of NSW. It may have been donated by Tasmanian collector John Watt Beattie, or accessioned from the publishers Angus & Robertson by David Scott Mitchell before 1907.
The SLNSW may have sourced it from the Charles Melbourne Ward (1903-1966) Collections which were donated originally to the Australian Museum. Charles Melbourne Ward's fascination for marine zoology would account for this photograph of conchologist William Legrand in his collections. Several items were presented by Kerry Cramp and the Australian Museum in 1987-1989 and 1999-2000 to the State Library of NSW. Pic.Acc.6864 and Pic.Acc.6974 combined. The University of Sydney also holds a significant Mel Ward Collection. Read a more extensive biography of Charles Melbourne Ward at ABD.
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