Thomas J. Nevin | Tasmanian Photographer

The Excelsior Coal Mine at New Town 1874

COAL MINES NEW TOWN Tasmania
CITY AGENT Thos NEVIN

Detail: Stereograph of coal mine operation, Kangaroo Valley, 1870s
Photographer: Thos Nevin, New Town (stamped verso).
TMAG Collection Ref: Q16826.11.

1871: Messrs Noble and Smart defrauded
From the notice below, which appeared in the Mercury, February 1871, it would seem that inferior coal or pit refuse from abandoned pits was being sold to the public as the property of the New Town coal mines owned by Messrs Noble and Smart. The fraud included falsified weigh-bridge tickets.

Fraudulent Imposition: Noble and Smart advertisement
Mercury, 4 February 1871

1873-4: Tasmanian coal taken to London
The former Commandant at Port Arthur, James Boyd, incumbent to the position prior to the appointment of A.H. Boyd (who was NOT a photographer), had left Tasmania by the 29th December 1873 on the barque Ethel, bound for England (per The Mercury, 29 Dec 1873). On board were specimens of Tasmanian coal, minerals, blue gum and other specimens of Eucalyptus of interest to the British Royal Colonial Institute. The Ethel was due to arrive in England on April 4th, 1874.

State Library of Victoria
Barque Ethel ca, 1873, New Wharf, Hobart, Tasmania
Unattributed.
Identifier(s): Accession no(s) H91.108/2316; H99.220/773
Alan Green Collection Shipping Photographs in Picture Collection.

The Mercury, 8 May 1874
Extract from mail received from the Royal Colonial Institute

TRANSCRIPT

"... through the exertions of the corresponding secretary of the Institute in Tasmania - Mr Hugh Munro Hull - a valuable contribution to the museum has been despatched from that colony, consisting of specimens of its coal ...
....
"It will be remembered that Mr. and Mrs. [James] Boyd, late Commandant of Port Arthur, were passengers by the Ethel."

The year 1874 was a busy one for Thomas Nevin. He was under contract to the Municipal Police Office and Prisons Department to provide mugshots of prisoners received and discharged at the Hobart Gaol for the MPO registers, photo books and police gazettes at the Town Hall, while continuing to operate full-time as a commercial photographer from his studio at 140 Elizabeth-Street in Hobart. His second child, Thomas James "Sonny" Nevin, was born on 16th April 1874. His membership of the Loyal United Brothers' Lodge annual Anniversary Ball committee entailed the provision of photographic services on the night of the ball, and extended to placing advertisements in The Mercury to procure professional services for Lodge members and their family, including medical services. And he worked closely with the printers at the Hobart newspaper offices of The Mercury, producing miniature photographs of the front pages for sale as Christmas visiting cards (measuring 3 inches x 2 inches).

1874: Sims and Stops' Coal Mine

Horse-drawn whim at Mr Sim's Excelsior Coal Mine, Kangaroo Valley, New Town, Tasmania
Stereograph on arched buff mount by Thomas J. Nevin, 1870s
"Thos Nevin New Town" studio stamp on verso
Tasmanian Museum and Art Gallery Collection
TMAG Ref: Q16826.11

Verso: Horse-drawn whim at Mr Sim's Excelsior Coal Mine, Kangaroo Valley, New Town, Tasmania
Stereograph on arched buff mount by Thomas J. Nevin, 1870s
"Thos Nevin New Town" studio stamp on verso
Tasmanian Museum and Art Gallery Collection
TMAG Ref: Q16826.11

Thomas Nevin was a city agent for coal deliveries from Messrs Sims and Stops coal mine, located at Kangaroo Valley New Town, close to the family farm where John Nevin snr had built their cottage and orchards on land in trust to the Wesleyan church above the Lady Franklin Museum. The Nevin family were closely associated (related even) to the Hurst family of surveyors resident of New Town and the Saltwater coal mines (on the Tasman peninsula). As stakeholders in the coal business, and probably shareholders in several other profitable businesses, Thomas Nevin, unlike several other members of his photographers' cohort in Tasmania and Victoria, escaped bankruptcy when they didn't (e.g. Alfred Bock, George Cherry, Stephen Spurling, Harold Riise, and Charles Nettleton in Victoria etc), and managed to keep his wife and children (six survived to adulthood) in comfortable circumstances.

Mr Nevin, photographer, Elizabeth-street, appears in this advertisement as an agent able to take orders for the delivery of coal from the Excelsior Coal Mine which was located on Mr Ebenezer Sims property at Kangaroo Bottom (Kangaroo Valley New Town), in close proximity to the home of Nevin's parents. This coal was for domestic use but may have been included in the coal specimens which were exported to the Royal Colonial Institute, accompanied by James Boyd on board the Ethel in 1874.

The Mercury, 22 December 1874

COALS! DOMESTIC COALS!
EXCELSIOR MINE, NEW TOWN
SIMS and STOPS' NEW SEAM
... N.B. - When from the situation a second horse is necessary, a small extra charge will be made.
ORDERS will be received by the undermentioned persons:-
...
Mr Nevin, photographer, Elizabeth-street ...

Members of the Stops family were close friends of Thomas Nevin and his father John Nevin snr at Kangaroo Valley. Frederick Stops was clerk to the Attorney-General W.R. Giblin when Nevin was the contractual photographer for police and prisons records for Giblin. His brother Henry Stops was an orchardist living at New Town until his death in 1908, and leasee of Mr Ebenenzer's coal mine. Ebenezer Sims' coal mines and other property at Kangaroo Bottom had been advertised for sale earlier, in January 1874, and the "late Mr E. Sims" was presumably departed from the partnership with Mr. Stops, or even deceased. However, the Excelsior Coal Mine continued to operate on his property and in his name, together with the stakeholders and agents listed in the advertisement with Nevin's name:

The Mercury, FOR SALE, 23 January 1874
Auction advertisement for the sale of the late Mr E. Sim's coal mines leased to Mr H. Stops at Kangaroo Bottom.

1883: dense basaltic dykes

The Mercury 23 December 1883:

"Mr Ebenezer Sim's coal mine ... is wrought by means of a horse-whim ..."

A lengthy geological report was published in The Mercury, 23 December 1883, on the coal mines and seams around Mt Wellington, including a description of the methods of mining at Mr Ebenezer Sim's Excelsior Coal Mine and an account of the formation of anthracite, shale and sandstone in the Kangaroo Valley area.

RELATED POSTS main weblog

Stereograph of coal mine operation, Kangaroo Valley, 1870s
Photographer: Thos Nevin, New Town (stamped verso).
TMAG Collection Ref: Q16826.11. Taken at the TMAG November 10, 2014.
Photos © KLW NFC Imprint ARR

Husbands and Wives NPG Exhibition 2010

An exhibition of early colonial portraits titled HUSBANDS and WIVES has recently opened at the National Portrait Gallery, Canberra Australia. Apart from the usual collection of cartes-de-visite, there are several daguerreotypes and ambrotypes of individuals, couples and family groups on display, including the coloured ambrotype by Thomas Glaister, ca. 1858 (below, from the NPG online).

Ambrotypes typically have a dark background, and daguerreotypes typically reflect light from the metal on which the image is fixed, rendering these two types of photographs difficult to view in natural light; the former is often too dark and the latter too bright and mirror-like. They are even more difficult to appreciate in a gallery context which might maintain adherence to industry-standard lighting but which ignores the very special requirements of lighting, placement on walls or in cabinets behind glass, and distance at which the spectator is kept from these two types of early photographs. The National Gallery has made no effort to overcome these long-standing problems in this exhibition, resulting in a less than happy visitor experience.

Above: Ambrotype by Thomas Glaister ca 1858
Exhibition, Husbands and Wives, NPG Canberra 2010

Watch the News Item on the exhibition:
VIDEO: ABC news online

The carte-de-visite portraits below by Thomas J. Nevin of himself with stereoscope (1865), his fiancee Elizabeth Rachel Day (1865), and of his wedding day with his bride Elizabeth Rachel (1871) were not in the exhibition, but one photograph on display has a connection with Nevin.

Titled "Married Couple with Dog" it features the carpet which Nevin had acquired from Alfred Bock by 1867, along with their studio and glass house at the City Photographic Establishment, 140 Elizabeth St. Hobart. The same carpet can be seen (below, right) in the solo portrait of Nevin's fiancee Elizabeth Rachel Day, taken ca. 1865. Nevin began an apprenticeship with Bock in early 1863 and succeeded to the business on Alfred Bock's sudden departure (due to insolvency) to Victoria in 1867.

The question then arises as to the attribution of the item titled "Married Couple with Dog". Further questions arise around the information provided by the NPG exhibition about this Alfred Bock photograph (borrowed from the NGA Collection). The accompanying commentary on a white card placed next to the photograph asserts that Alfred Bock's father Thomas Bock was a daguerreotypist, but in The Mercury on 22 May 1900 Alfred Bock claimed that his father never took a photograph in his life. The photograph in question is indicated in this TV snapshot (from the ABC news item) below:

Above: TV snapshot (from ABC news item).

The original ...

Alfred BOCK
Hobart Town, Australia 1835 – Wynyard, Tasmania 1920
Movements: 1867 Sale, Victoria 1882 Auckland, New Zealand 1887 Melbourne 1906 Wynyard, Tasmania
(Portrait of a couple with their dog) c.1866
sennotype image 18.4 h x 13.6 w cm
Purchased 1988
Accession No: NGA 88.1443

The photograph indicated on the wall is the one attributed to Alfred Bock in which the couple are seated on Nevin's carpet. It is the same carpet on which he photographed his bride-to-be, Elizabeth Rachel Day, ca. 1865 (below right):

Left: Thomas J. Nevin, ca. 1865, self-portrait with stereoscope and white gloves
Right: Elizabeth Rachel Day, ca. 1865 taken by Thomas J. Nevin.
Photos and originals © KLW NFC Imprint Private Collection 2010 ARR.

Above (detail) and below:
Husband and Wife, 12 July 1871
T.J. Nevin (1842-1923) and E.R. Day (1847-1914)
Photos and originals © KLW NFC Imprint Private Collection 2010 ARR.

The NEVIN-DAY wedding photograph pictured here placed on the original brown paper in which the family has kept this carte and several others of family members by Thomas Nevin (below).

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 was built on the traditional lands, nipaluna/Hobart, 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 people of the Australian Capital Territory 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.

Our 19th Anniversary 2005-2024

Click on image for full list tagged "About women"

NINETEEN YEARS ago (before 2005 actually) we started blogging about Tasmanian photographer Thomas J. Nevin (1842-1923). We look forward to another year or so as the project draws closer to completion. Contributions and donations are most welcome, and many thanks for your involvement.

SABBATICAL 2023-24: We are taking a short break from regular posting through 2024 but will be available to answer queries.

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