Showing posts with label Videos. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Videos. Show all posts

Thos J. Nevin, juror on the Casimaty case, SC Hobart, 1918

George CASIMATY's fish saloon 1918
Thomas J. NEVIN, juror, Supreme Court 1918
Xenophobia: Greek, Chinese businesses attacked
Military Police Tasmania 1912-1918

George JOYCE: the face of racism



"Like an ignorant and vicious man you tried to bait these foreigners, thinking to get fun out of abusing them. You ought to know, and the public ought to know that this man and any other foreigner is as much entitled to the protection of the law as any others, and shall be so so far as this court is concerned. I have frequently noticed in this Court and elsewhere of vicious, ignorant people thinking it good sport to abuse and bait Chinese and other foreigners."
On sentencing George Joyce to 12 months' imprisonment in the Casimaty Case
The Solicitor-General, Supreme Court Hobart 15 October 1918

Thos J. Nevin, juror on the Casimaty Case
It was either photographer Thomas James Nevin senior (1842-1923) resident of 270 Elizabeth St with a business at 279 Elizabeth St. Hobart, who was chosen for jury duty on the Casimaty case heard in the Supreme Court Hobart on 15 October, 1918, or it was his eldest son by the same name, Thomas James Nevin junior (1874-1948), bootmaker of 236 Elizabeth St. Hobart, known as Tom Nevin and "Sonny" to family.

Given that the names of two other members of the twelve-man jury - viz. Jacob Triffett, jun and Julian G. Brown, jun were indicated as "junior" and Thos Nevin  wasn't - where "jun" conventionally signified they were sons with the same name as their respective fathers - it may well have been Thomas J. Nevin senior who sat in the juror's box on this case. He had signed the birth registrations of his children with the same abbreviation of his name -  "Thos J. Nevin" - from 1872 on the first child's certificate (May's) to the last child's (Albert's) in 1888, with the exception of Tom's birth registration in 1874 which his father-in-law Captain James Day signed while he was away on business at Port Arthur. He was still listing his occupation as "photographer" when he signed youngest son Albert's marriage certificate to Emily Maud Davis in 1917,  and he was buried with the occupation "photographer" on his death records. It now seems possible from family memorabilia that Thomas J. Nevin snr collaborated with photographer Peter Laurie Reid during the 1890s-1911 up to Reid's death, aged 78 yrs in 1911 at Reid's property, 4 Andrew St. around the corner from Newdegate St. North Hobart where four of the Nevin adult children would settle at No's. 23-29 on their father's death and where they would remain until the death of the eldest (and unmarried) daughter May Nevin in 1955.

With the death in 1914 of his wife Elizabeth Rachel (Day) Nevin, mother of their six children to survive to adulthood, their eldest child May (Mary Florence Elizabeth) Nevin (1872-1955) stayed with her father to care for him at their residence, 270 Elizabeth St. Hobart where he died in 1923. From about 1913 and up to his death in 1923, Thomas J. Nevin snr was operating a livery yard and stables business at 279 Elizabeth St. where he was assisted by his youngest son Albert Edward Nevin (photo below) whose successes as a young trainer and reinsman of pacers at the racetracks in Launceston and Hobart were regularly noted by the press. So, when called for jury duty to sit on the Casimaty case in 1918, Thomas J. Nevin snr was selected as a registered business owner of a livery yard and stables which kept and boarded horses for owners who paid a weekly or monthly fee.

Nine (9) Tasmanian residents were listed with the surname NEVIN in Wise's Tasmanian Directory for 1913; all but two were members of the Nevin clan living in the north of the island and unrelated to the other two in the south - Thomas J. Nevin snr, who registered his livery business at 279 Elizabeth St. Hobart, and his wife Elizabeth Rachel (Day) Nevin, who was listed as Mrs E, 270 Elizabeth St, Hobart where they both resided and where Elizabeth Nevin died in 1914.



Mrs E, 270 Elizabeth St, Hobart
Nevin, Thos J, liv stble, 279 Eliz st. Hobt

Wise's Tasmanian Directory for 1913
Archives Office Tasmania
Link:https://libraries.tas.gov.au/Digital/AUTAS001126438076/AUTAS001126438076P1913PDF

Albert E Nevin, with horse 1914

Youngest son of Thos Nevin snr, Albert E. Nevin (1888-1955) at Nevin's livery stables, 279 Elizabeth St. Hobart
Verso inscribed "To Miss E. Davis, From Mr. A. Nevin, 1914"
Unattributed; black and white; cardboard frame
Copyright © KLW NFC Imprint Private Collection 2020

1918: the Casimaty Case
On 15 October 1918 before noon, a crowd of 30 to 50 people gathered outside Gregory Casimaty's fish shop and dining saloon at 35 Elizabeth Street, Hobart from where George Joyce had emerged and was attempting to kick in the shopfront window. This act of malice followed the scene inside the cafe where Joyce had sought to game the Greek proprietor and his assistant Basil Castrissos by refusing to pay for his meal and those of his two companions - his brother and another. Casimaty locked the doors until Joyce finally handed over 2 shillings but once outside, Joyce began kicking at the shop window. Gregory Casimaty attempted to stop him but was struck by Joyce's brother. Military Police Officer Dalziel claimed in court to have witnessed George Joyce smash the window on his third attempt at kicking it in and could corroborate Casimaty's evidence. Two more military police, P.O. McHare and Henry McNally corroborated Dalziel's evidence. The crowd, however, saw the situation in a different light by the time Gregory Casimaty had chased George Joyce up the street to the Empire hotel, caught him and pinned him down. Someone in the crowd struck the military policeman and pulled Casimaty off Joyce who then escaped and ran off towards Murray Street where he was spotted by army serviceman Private Sellars. Two local police constables, Hill and Godfrey arrived and arrested George Joyce on being identified as the offender by his victim Gregory Casimaty.



Source: Daily Telegraph (Launceston, Tas. : 1883 - 1928), Saturday 7 December 1912, page 6

TRANSCRIPT
MILITARY POLICE
As the State authorities have refused to allow their police to see that the compulsory training obligation under the Defence Act is enforced, the Minister for Defence has established a. form of military police. Under this arrangement Tasmania will have one sergeant-major who will receive £204 a year. The Minister offered the State police £6 a year, but most of the State Governments thought that it was not enough.

Source: MILITARY POLICE (1912, December 7). Daily Telegraph (Launceston, Tas.), p. 6
Link: https://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article152481861

The presence of military police on Hobart's streets was evidence of the State's refusal to train regular police under the Defence Act. With the loss of young men to military service at the Great War in Europe (1914-1918), the regular police force was both compromised and diminished. Their evidence in this case was discounted by George Joyce's defence attorney, Mr. O'Brien, who sought sympathy from the jury for Joyce as "a hard-working man, and the sole support of a widowed mother". Thos Nevin snr and the eleven other members of the jury were not swayed. They took just fifteen minutes to deliver their verdict of guilty.

Trial of George JOYCE, 15 October 1918
Source: SUPREME COURT. (1918, October 16). The Mercury (Hobart, Tas. : 1860 - 1954), p. 7.
Link: https://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article11413316

TRANSCRIPT
SUPREME COURT.
HOBART CRIMINAL SITTINGS.

At the criminal sittings of the Supreme Court yesterday, Mr Justice Crisp presided.

The following jury was empanelled :-
Joseph Bradley (foreman), John Marney, Theodore Batten, Wm. E Smith, Wm H. Cripps, Thos. J Nevin, Jacob Triffett, jun., Jos. Nichols, Sydney Alomes, Jas. Gallagher, Wm. Reynolds, Julian G. Brown, jun.

George Joyce was charged with having wilfully and maliciously damaged the window of Gregory Casimaty's fish saloon at 35 Elizabeth-street, Hobart, on August 17, 1918. Accused pleaded not guilty.

The Solicitor-General (Mr. Chambers) prosecuted, and Mr. O'Brien appeared for the defence.

The Solicitor-General pointed out that the damage amounted to £18 10s.

Gregory Casimaty, restaurant-keeper, of 35 Elizabeth street, stated that accused, after having had supper with three other men, refused to pay. Witness then instructed one of his shop assistants to close the door, and informed accused that if he did not pay the police would be called in. After threatening witness, accused struck at one of the restaurant assistants - Basil Castrissos.

Finally accused paid 2s., and went outside with his brother, and began to swear and invite witness outside to fight. Accused's brother attempted to strike witness while accused kicked at the window three times. At the third kick he broke it, and ran away. Witness followed him, and caught him outside the Empire Hotel, where accused fell. Witness held him down awaiting the police. A military policeman came up and assisted witness. One of the crowd struck the military policeman, who then let Joyce go. The crowd pulled witness away from accused, who escaped up Elizabeth street. At 12 pm witness, in consequence of a summons, saw the accused at the corner of Murray and Bathurst Street and identified him as the person who had broken his window.

In reply to Mr. 0'Brien, witness said disturbances were not frequent in his restaurant, as a result of his hasty temper. The accused and his brother had not paid for their supper until they were threatened with the police. At the time of the breaking of the window there were between 30 and 50 people outside the shop.

Basil Castrissos, assistant at Casimaty's restaurant said that when he asked the accused and his brother for payment, the brother said, "I have no money to pay you, but if you want a fight, I will fight you." Subsequently they went out after paying, and accused said "If you do not come out and fight , I will smash your window." Thereupon, he made three kicks at the window. The last smashed it. Witness corroborated Casimaty's evidence from this stage.

In reply to Mr. O'Brien, witness said he was not the cause of the disturbance. He saw accused break the window.

P.O. Dalziel, military policeman, said he saw accused break the window, From this stage he corroborated Casimaty's evidence.

P.O. McHare, military policeman, corroborated Dalziel's evidence. He said he accompanied him on the night of the disturbance.

Henry McNally, military policeman, corroborated Dalziel also. He said he was satisfied beyond doubt that the accused was the man who broke the window.

Constable Hill stated that accused was pointed out to him on the corner of Liverpool and Elizabeth streets at 12 pm by Private Sellars. Accused then ran off to towards Murray street, and was taken in a lane off that street a few minutes later. Accused refused to move until Casimaty and Constable Godfrey came up.

Constable Godfrey testified that he had arrested, and took him to the police station.

Gregory Casimaty, recalled, gave evidence that the window was 3ft from the asphalt.

The Solicitor-General, addressing the jury, said there was no question that the breaking of the window was deliberate and malicious. The evidence showed that accused had made three kicks at the window. The fact that he ran off when the damage was done strengthened the belief that he was guilty. Each witness deposed that he had seen accused break the window.

Mr. O'Brien, addressing the jury, said it was not likely that accused could make three kicks at the window without being molested and prevented by Casimaty, or Castrissos. He discounted the evidence of all the witnesses for the Crown.

His Honor in summing up said the only question the jury had to decide was whether accused was the guilty party. The accused man and his companion has meanly tried to cheat Casimaty, and when asked to pay maliciously broke his window, that was if the evidence of the Crown was to be believed, the question hinged entirely, it would appear, on identity, and five witnesses had deposed that they saw accused kick at the window. It would be a peculiar thing if Casimaty was trying to do business in the city and abusing his customers, as counsel for the defence had suggested.

The jury, after a quarter of an hour's retirement, returned a verdict of guilty.

Mr O'Brien pleaded in mitigation of penalty that accused was a hard-working man, and the sole support of a widowed mother.

His Honor sentenced the prisoner to 12 months' imprisonment, and said: - "Your unmanly and vicious action of August 17 caused a considerable disturbance. I have no doubt that this trouble arose from the fact that you tried to defraud a foreigner of what was justly due to him. Like an ignorant and vicious man you tried to bait these foreigners, thinking to get fun out of abusing them. You ought to know, and the public ought to know that this man and any other foreigner is as much entitled to the protection of the law as any others, and shall be so so far as this court is concerned. I have frequently noticed in this Court and elsewhere of vicious, ignorant people thinking it good sport to abuse and bait Chinese and other foreigners.

Source: SUPREME COURT. (1918, October 16). The Mercury (Hobart, Tas. : 1860 - 1954), p. 7.
Link: https://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article11413316

Chinese businesses in Hobart
The Solicitor-General's reference to the abuse of Chinese businesses in particular in his summing up and sentencing of George Joyce would suggest similar cases of racism were frequently reported to police and tried in the courts. The newly formed Federal Parliament's introduction of the Immigration Restriction Act of 1901 officially sanctioned racism in so much as it sought to keep Asians and Pacific Islanders out of a "white Australia".

White Australia badge

Brass ‘White Australia’ protection badge, 1906.
The words ‘population’, ‘production’, ‘progress’ and ‘protection’ appear on the other side.
Source: National Museum of Australia
Link: https://www.nma.gov.au/defining-moments/resources/white-australia-policy

Despite decades of insults and abuse, even murder, (see this post about prisoner Daniel Davis 1883, 1892 and 1897), the Chinese who had established businesses in Hobart before the 1901 Immigration Act continued to operate as fruiterers, green-grocers, market gardeners, tobacconists, gift and fancy goods retailers, and industrial laundries. For example, by 1918 these businesses in Elizabeth St. and surrounds would no doubt have experienced the sort of racism metered out to Gregory Casimaty at his fish saloon by the likes of George Joyce:
Ah Chung Mrs, tob & fcy gds, 96 Eliz st, Hobart
Chung-Doo W, grngrcr, 45 Bathurst st, Hobart
Chung J, fncy gds, 77a Eliz st, Hobart
War Shing, lndry 302 Eliz st Hobart
Lee Ping, laundry 394 Eliz st Hobart
Chong W Y, frtr, 71 Harrington st, Hobart
Goong Peter L, greengrocer, 103 Murray st Hobart
Ah Toy, Albert rd, Moonah
Ah Wak, mkt gdnr. 10 Forster st, New Town
Chinese businesses in Elizabeth St. Hobart and surrounds
Source: 1917-1918 Wises' Tasmanian Directory
Archives Office Tasmania
Link:https://libraries.tas.gov.au/Digital/AUTAS001126438076P1918PDF

George Joyce's rap sheet, 1913-1918

George Joyce mugshots 1918

Photo No. 506c, 18-10-1918
Mugshots of George JOYCE, profile with cap, full-frontal no hat, pasted to rap sheet below:

Joyce, George rap sheet 1918

Rap sheet: George JOYCE
Archives Office Tasmania. Link:https://libraries.tas.gov.au/Digital/GD63-1-5P493

George JOYCE, Hobart Gaol record 1918
DETAILS TRANSCRIBED from page 60408.
Joyce, George. Native, Free. R&W. [read and write]. Single.
Photo no. 506s.
F.P. Class m [Finger print class male] 13/18 R/A (00/.) 21

Trade: Plasterer's labourer
Religion: R.C. [Roman Catholic]
Height: 5ft 10 in
Weight: 10st [stone], 12½ lbs[pounds]
Date of birth: 26/3/1894 [3 March]
Complexion: Fresh
Head: Med [medium]
Hair: Brown
Whiskers: - [none]
Visage: Oval
Forehead: Broad
Eyebrows: Brown
Eyes: Grey
Nose: Med large
Mouth: Small
Chin: Deep
Native Place: Hobart
Marks: Indistinct tattoo marks including G. J. , left forearm. Large scar on same arm below tattooing, dot between left thumb index finger & ring on left little finger.
8.7.13 P.O. Hobart - Disturbing the peace - Fined £1 & costs
11.2.14 Ditto - Indecent language - Fined 10/- or 7 days
15.10.18 S. C. Hobart - Maliciously damaging property - 12 months

George JOYCE, Police Gazette notice 1918

SC record 1918 George Joyce

Police Gazette Tasmania October 25, 1918. Page 205.
Tasmania police gazette for police information only
Link:https://libraries.tas.gov.au/Digital/POLICEGAZETTE/POL709-1-46P207

The key details included in this notice were transcribed directly from George Joyce's rap sheet:

Conviction for the offence of maliciously damaging property, sentenced to 12 months.
Native of Tasmania, a plasterer's labourer by trade, born 1894.
Height 5ft 10in.
Fresh complexion, brown hair, grey eyes, large nose.

Previous Gazette reference, 1918, p.180.
Distinguishing marks and Number of photograph: indistinct tattoo marks, including G. J. on left forearm, large scar on same arm below tattooing, dot between left thumb and index finger, ring on left little finger. Photo No. 506c.

Resources: the Casimaty family

Biographies

1. Companion to Tasmanian History
Source: https://www.utas.edu.au/library/companion_to_tasmanian_history/C/Casimaty%20family.htm

[Photo: Bill Casimaty, Senate candidate 1975 (AOT, PH30/1/5051)]
The Casimaty family first visited Australia when Georgios Kasimatis (1866–1959) worked in Sydney, 1891–96. He returned to Greece, but sent his four children to Australia. All ended up in Tasmania.

Georgios' oldest son Gregory (1890–1972) came to Sydney in 1905 and arrived in Hobart in 1914. He bought a fruit shop and turned it into a restaurant, the Britannia Café, but the brothers, Gregory, Anthony (1897–1977) and Basil (1902–1962), were best known for their wholesale and retail fishing enterprises. Casimaty Bros' fish shop (1918) was a Hobart landmark for decades. They were also among the pioneers of the crayfish and scallop industries, exporting crayfish to Sydney.

The brothers were extremely successful, playing a major role in Hobart commercial life, and Gregory and his wife Katina were particularly known for their philanthropy. Many other family members joined them in Hobart. In the 1940s the family began purchasing farming properties: Llanherne and Acton at Cambridge, Strathayr at Richmond, Christianmarsh at Bothwell, and Stockman at Kempton. Strathayr became particularly well-known for Bill Casimaty's flourishing instant lawn enterprise.

Further reading: H Kalis, Casimaty family, 1891–1996, Hobart, 1996.
Helen Kalis. Copyright 2006, Centre for Tasmanian Historical Studies

2. Australian Dictionary of Biography
Source: https://adb.anu.edu.au/biography/casimaty-anthony-george-9978

CASIMATY BROTHERS: Gregory George (1890-1972), Anthony George (1897-1977) and Basil George (1903-1962), fishermen, fishmongers and restaurateurs, were born on 6 January 1890, 15 March 1897 and 2 February 1903 at Kithira, Greece, sons of Georgios Grigoriou Kasimatis (d.1959), farmer, and his wife Stamatina, née Kastrisios. The brothers received an elementary education and, with their father's encouragement, emigrated separately to Australia.

Gregory left Greece in 1905. Arriving in Sydney, he washed dishes at the Acropolis Café for nine months, spent several years in the fruit trade in Queensland and in 1911 came back to Sydney. In 1914 he went to Hobart where, with Peter Galanis, he established the Britannia Café in Elizabeth Street; next year he took over the business in partnership with his brother Anthony. Casimaty Brothers initially leased, then bought the premises occupied by their café and by the fish shop which they had added. By 1918 they had expanded into cray-fishing, exporting their catch to Sydney, and they later pioneered the scallop industry in Tasmania. Appointed fishmongers to the governor Sir James O'Grady, the brothers expanded their partnership to include Basil.

In 1928 Gregory returned to Kithira, married Katina (Kathleen) Haros and brought her to Tasmania. He visited New Zealand in 1935 to open the firm's crayfish markets there. The Casimatys developed seine-fishing in Australian waters, commissioning the trawler, Nelson, and acquiring the Margaret Twaits. In 1941 the Tasmanian Fisheries Board of Enquiry investigated allegations of monopolizing and of environmental damage by Casimatys' fishermen, only to find the claims unproven. Anticipating better markets, the brothers sent the boats to Sydney, but became disillusioned when Victor Vanges, skipper of the Margaret Twaits, was drowned off Eden and the trawlers were commandeered for war service in New Guinea.

During the Depression the Casimatys had provided hundreds of Christmas dinners for the needy and promoted a free-milk scheme for schoolchildren. In World War II the family supported the Tasmanian branch of the Australian Red Cross Society; for his contribution to the international organization, Gregory was awarded the Red Cross medal of Greece (1946) and the Silver Cross of Phoenix (1950). In 1945 Gregory's case against the Federal government for attempting to tax and to raise loans under the national security regulations was settled out of court.

Hobart's Greek Orthodox Church of St George was built in Antill Street in 1957 on land provided by the Casimatys. The family also gave land on Kithira for an old people's home which was named Kasimateion in their honour. Among the first Greeks to settle in Tasmania, the Casimatys supported later immigrants from their homeland and fostered Greek-Australian relations.

Portly and 5 ft 6 ins (168 cm) tall, Gregory was known for his hospitality and for his practical jokes. He was an active member (from 1936) of the Rotary Club, Hobart, he supported the Tasmanian Society for the Care of Crippled Children and he was foundation president (1953) of the Greek Community of Hobart and Tasmania. Kathleen shared her husband's community involvement; a life member of Elizabeth Street State School Mothers' Club and of the Inner Wheel Club, she was a member of Task Force Action for Migrant Women and acted as a volunteer interpreter for many years. Ill health obliged Gregory to retire in 1965. Survived by his wife, two sons and four daughters, he died on 22 March 1972 at Sandy Bay and was buried with Greek Orthodox rites in Cornelian Bay cemetery.

Anthony sailed from Greece in 1912 and worked in Sydney cafés before joining Gregory in Hobart in 1915. Anthony returned to Greece in 1931 where, two years later, he married Adamantia (Manty) Haros, sister of Gregory's wife. Back in Hobart, he was a member of the Chamber of Commerce and often acted as spokesman for the retail fish industry. A life member of the Goulburn Street State School Mothers' Club, Manty was a volunteer medical interpreter for the Greek community for forty years. Immaculately dressed and with impeccable manners, Anthony was small and rather shy, yet he had boundless energy, enjoyed life and indulged a passion for hunting. After some fifty years in the fish shop, he retired in 1967. Survived by his wife, two sons and two daughters, he died on 14 March 1977 at Sandy Bay and was buried in the same cemetery as his brothers.

Basil joined his brothers in Hobart in 1923, but went back to Greece in 1929 to care for their ageing parents. While there, he married Panagiota (Nota) Tzoutzouris in 1935; they were to remain childless. The couple came to Tasmania in 1939. Basil soon left the partnership to open the California Fruit Co. in Hobart. During the 1940s he purchased Stockman, a property at Kempton, on which he ran cattle and sheep, while Nota managed the fruit business. Responsible for introducing Greek films to Tasmania, he was president of the Greek Community of Hobart and Tasmania (1958-60) and of the Olympia Soccer Club. Survived by his wife, he died of a coronary occlusion on 18 August 1962 at Sandy Bay and was buried in Cornelian Bay cemetery.

Select Bibliography
G. V. Brooks, 30 Years of Rotary in Hobart (Hob, 1955)
Fisheries Newsletter, 7, no 1, Feb 1948
Mercury (Hobart), 27 Dec 1930, 10 Dec 1935, 23 July, 24 Dec 1941, 20 Aug 1962, 23 Mar 1972
Casimaty family papers (privately held).
Citation details
Anne Tucceri, 'Casimaty, Anthony George (1897–1977)', Australian Dictionary of Biography, National Centre of Biography, Australian National University, https://adb.anu.edu.au/biography/casimaty-anthony-george-9978/text17139, published first in hardcopy 1993, accessed online 28 August 2024.
This article was published in hardcopy in Australian Dictionary of Biography, Volume 13, (Melbourne University Press), 1993

Films and Photographs
This film Coastal scallop fishing in southern Tasmanian waters was made by the Tasmanian Film Corporation in the 1940s. It documents the journey of scallops from being caught at sea to their sale on the waterfront and at Casimaty Bros.' fish shop in Elizabeth St. Hobart. The film has no sound and in parts is in poor condition, but it is well worth a viewing.

View online: https://libraries.tas.gov.au/Digital/AB869-1-965
Link: https://libraries.tas.gov.au/Record/Archives/AB869-1-965



Screenshot: The Casimaty Bros' shop sequence appears at 15.02. Watch to the end - there is a little joke from the original editors who run the film in reverse showing three men in a restaurant drinking beer and eating scallops and then undrinking the beer and uneating the scallops. The final frame shows a profile photograph of King George VI, father of Queen Elizabeth II.



Screenshot: a woman buying scallops from the boat at Constitution Dock, Hobart.



Screenshots: Casimaty Bros' sign, shopfront and customers, 35 Elizabeth St. Hobart, Tasmania





1. Film - Coastal scallop fishing in southern Tasmanian waters, including inspection from the Sea Fisheries vessel 'Allara' of legal size limits, selling scallops on the Hobart waterfront, Casimaty's fish shop, and IXL canned scallops.
Item Number: AB869/1/965
Further Description: 16ECINEG 16mm internegative, colour, no sound 18min 24sec, poor condition 480 ft. No.2 internegative D.F.P. Original record: 4092.
Start Date: 01 Jan 1940
End Date: 31 Dec 1949
Source: Tasmanian Archives
Format: film
Creating Agency: Department of Film Production (TA178) 01 Jan 1960 31 Dec 1977
Tasmanian Film Corporation (TA179) 01 Jan 1977 31 Dec 1982
Administrator, Tasmanian Film Corporation (TA1021) 01 Jan 1983 31 Dec 1993
Series: Films and Videos Produced and Acquired by the Agency (AB869) 01 Jan 1950 31 Dec 1995
View online: https://libraries.tas.gov.au/Digital/AB869-1-965
Link: https://libraries.tas.gov.au/Record/Archives/AB869-1-965

2. Film - Tasmanian Magazine Number 6 - Strathyr Mushrooms (Casimaty's) - violin maker Gordon Triffitt - mini motor racing model cars - shot tower jeweller Max Sawbridge. Sponsored by Tourist Department.
Item Number AB869/1/2707
Series Films and Videos Produced and Acquired by the Agency (AB869)
Start Date 01 Jan 1961 End Date 31 Dec 1962
Format film
View online AB869-1-2707https://youtu.be/BV9lFOvIFF8

3. 35mm colour transparency - Hobart - Elizabeth Street - Casimaty's "City Fish Supply" - shop front - March 1977
Item Number:NS3373/1/310
Further Description: Reproduction of the images to acknowledge Margaret Bryant as the photographer.
Start Date:01 Apr 1976 End Date: 01 Mar 1980
Source: Tasmanian Archives
Format: photograph
Creating Agency: Margaret Bryant (NG2652)01 Jan 1950 Series: Margaret Bryant Photographs (NS3373) 01 Apr 1976-01 Mar 1980
View online: https://libraries.tas.gov.au/Digital/NS3373-1-310/NS3373-1-310



Casimaty's City Fish Supply shopfront with fish shop rain pouring down (inside) the window displaying fresh fish, poultry and rabbits, photographed in 1977 (M. Bryant). The sign "THIS IS A METRIC SHOP" referred to the introduction of decimal currency to Australia in February 1966. 

Paper documents

4. Hobart- Premises of G. Casimaty- Complaint re. Nuisance Caused by Scallops and others
(vide report of Sergent Challenger)
Item Number: HSD1/1/3292
Start Date:04 Mar 1938 End Date:16 Dec 1938
Source: Tasmanian Archives
Format: file/volume Creating Agency: Department of Public Health (TA19)

5. Artwork, negatives, mock-ups for labels, stationery, containers, publications for Casimaty's Cafe
Item Number: NS1211/1/44
Start Date:01 Jan 1920
Link: https://libraries.tas.gov.au/Record/Archives/NS1211-1-44

Beware AI generated images of your criminal ancestors!

Eugenicist Hamish Maxwell-Stewart's AI fake photographs of 19th century Tasmanian convicts
Breaches of Moral Rights and Copyright of heritage property using AI generated data
Thomas J. Nevin's real photographs/mugshots of Tasmanian prisoners taken in the 1870s-1880s.



Source of talk at the National Family History Month - Opening Ceremony
- https://familyhistorymonth.org.au/index.php/videos/video/2023-opening-ceremony
Topic: Artificial Intelligence

PRETTY CARTOONS
Why would you accept an AI generated image of your deceased family member which was made from data taken from various unrelated photographic and non-photographic sources when you may already possess a real photograph of that person or their immediate descendant? Then don't. Protest about this to the National Trust of Tasmania, to the Australian Research Council and the Australian Copyright Council.

No extent of warnings that the images created are FAKE will ever account for Hamish Maxwell-Stewart's waste of public research money in this, his latest attempt at messing up the digital environment with FAKE images of your deceased family members which he has assigned to YOUR REAL FAMILY NAMES. These images are FICTIONS playing with eugenics and phrenology all over again, this time with a new toy called ChatGPT. The resultant image of YOUR CONVICT is a pretty cartoon akin to the coloured drawings created by Simon Barnard's representation of convicts in his illustrated book Convict tattoos : marked men and women of Australia, (Melbourne, Vic. The Text Publishing Company, 2016.) Website: https://www.simonbarnard.com.au/product/convict-tattoos/

In a new exhibition assisted by Andrew Redfern called UNSHACKLED (2023) proposed for the National Trust at the old Penitentiary, Hobart Gaol, Campbell Street, Maxwell-Stewart wants you to believe this nonsensical indulgence is worthwhile. No it isn't. It's a waste of time and money, with no authentic historical merit and no apology for any distress he is causing to bearers of those family names. He has created FAKE images of 19th Tasmanian prisoners to show YOU what your ancestor MIGHT have looked like, subsuming in the process those real photographs already extant in Australian public collections, correctly attributed to government contractor Thomas J. Nevin taken in the 1870s, and now building on a previous mess of FAKE and homogenised "Port Arthur offenders" images of 1870s prisoners he developed for an earlier exhibition held there at the Old Penitentiary in 2019.

The field called criminal anthropology (to which this project affects an affiliation) long ago discredited Lombroso's stereotype, the "criminal type", with Goring's study published in 1913 of  statistics gathered from 3000 prisoners in British prisons over a ten year-period:


Dr. Charles Goring, Deputy Medical Officer of H. M. Prison, London, in the Most Important Contribution of Recent Years to Criminology Upsets Accepted Theories Through Statistics Gathered from 3,000 Convicts.



"THERE IS NO CRIMINAL TYPE," SAYS PRISON EXPERT
THE NEW YORK TIMES
November 2, 1913, Sunday Section: Magazine Section, Page SM13, 4250 words
THE 'criminal type' is an anthropological monster. There is no such thing as a criminal type.' In other words, the criminal is a normal person, not markedly different from the rest of humanity who have managed to keep out of prison. In other words, there are in ministers and Cambridge undergraduates and college professors the making of pickpockets and thieves, as well as murderers and forgers...
Read about the REAL photographs of Tasmanian prisoners ("convicts" in tourism discourse) taken by government contractor Thomas J. NEVIN in the 1870s-1880:

- https://tasmanianphotographer.blogspot.com/2008/07/the-parkhurst-prisoners-anthropometry.html
- https://tasmanianphotographer.blogspot.com/2019/07/exhibition-2019-t-j-nevins-mugshot-of.html.
- https://prisonerpics.blogspot.com/.
- https://thomasnevin.com/category/19th-century-prison-photography/

Clip: Beware AI generated images of your criminal ancestors! #1



Clip uploaded to Thomas Nevin's Youtube channel:
- https://www.youtube.com/@klwnfcgroup/featured
- https://youtu.be/av_9D3mZ3wQ?si=-3Hmzr1syfiYEB5k

Note here Maxwell-Stewart's assumption that his gratuitous act of using the NAMES and photographic records of REAL people and their families to attach to his AI generated FANTASY IMAGES of their ancestors is perfectly fine. It is not. He is breaching their moral rights and their copyright.

TRANSCRIPT
0:00 so I wanted to quickly say a little bit
0:02 about how we're generating those images
0:03 so the the AI takes the physical
0:06 description from the record the age of
0:09 the prisoner and where they're born and
0:11 it matches them to 19th century prison
0:14 and other photographs that we've
0:17 harvested online now again as we get
0:20 better at this what I want to do is to
0:23 create our own
0:25 um resource of images
0:28 um so that we can fine-tune this
0:31 experience but the images of individual
0:34 convicts have been created by merging
0:36 multiple photographs which share
0:38 characteristics
with their record
0:41 and the faces that have been generated
0:43 are really quite striking so this is um
0:46 one we generated for William Allen and
0:48 again this is almost certainly not what
0:50 William Allen would have looked like
but
0:52 I think it's it's best seen as the AI's
0:54 best guess at what he might have looked
0:56 like
0:58 and this allows us to um you know we're
1:01 playing around with slogans now for this
1:03 experience
1:11 and we can also do this so this is
1:13 Michael Heath who's one of our amazing
1:16 volunteers there are about 40 volunteers
1:19 who just pump data into various um
1:22 projects that digital history Tasmania
1:24 is focusing on
1:26 um Michael like many of you are the
1:27 volunteers who who spend time with with
1:30 DHT
1:32 um is a descendant of a convict and so
1:34 we fed his photograph into the AI and
1:37 this is the the image that the AI came
1:40 up with for his
1:42 convict ancestor and I think this gives
1:45 you an indication of how we can we can
1:47 get better at this image Generation by
1:49 seeding more and more photographs in we
1:52 want to use the photographs that James [sic - John]
1:55 Watt Beattie took uh Tasmanians in the
1:58 1890s because we'll know a lot about
2:01 their descent to fine-tune this process
2:04 um even further
2:07 and here you can see a whole lot more of
2:10 these and we're hoping that that this
2:13 the AI will provide a new way for
2:16 visitors to Hobart to engage with the
2:19 convict past and to actually understand
2:21 the work that family historians and
2:23 academic historians have done ...
Source: Beware AI generated images of your criminal ancestors! #1
Thomas J. Nevin: https://youtu.be/av_9D3mZ3wQ?si=-3Hmzr1syfiYEB5k

What is the point of this expensive project, apart from Maxwell-Stewart's personal motivation to prolong his academic career in the space of penal history? Attendees at this talk expressed strong misgivings that the CREATED IMAGES of their ancestors, using both mugshots and family photographs, will not be fully understood as AI FICTIONS when viewed and copied. These are some of their questions and responses from Maxwell-Stewart and Andrew Redfern:



Clip: Beware AI generated images of your criminal ancestors! #2
https://youtu.be/yhiCaXMadqk?si=3FGNzVZWBDVhjALp

TRANSCRIPT
0:01 uh where there are known photographs of
0:04 convicts I have one of a convict as an
0:06 older man could these be compared with
0:09 an AI generated image to test the
0:12 accuracy
0:15 um yes so one of the things that AI can
0:17 do is unage a photograph
0:20 and so
0:22 um yeah that's I think great potential
0:25 for using photographs taken at different
0:27 stages in life to try and reconstruct
0:31 what somebody might have looked like at
0:32 a younger age
0:35 and I think your example to Hamish of
0:37 the um your volunteer that you uploaded
0:40 his photo and then generated the
0:42 ancestor I think that's a great example
0:44 of that as well where the the two yes it
0:47 can sort of take Modern Images or other
0:49 images and then cross-reference and
0:51 correlate
0:54 and there's a great line in in the chat
0:56 as well for Maureen about
0:58 um how do we prevent these being passed
1:00 ff as the real images online and I mean
1:02 I think that's a that is a huge danger
1:04 and so as a community I think that we
1:06 have to construct guidelines for the use
1:10 of all of this
1:11 um you know when the penitentiary
1:14 experience on Chapel goes live we need
1:16 to have a
1:17 um a statement about how these images
1:19 were created and they're not what the
1:22 individual would have looked like but
1:24 it's using the best tools in order to
1:27 try and imagine what they might have
1:28 looked like
1:30 um and there's a a an interesting little
1:34 line from Michelle there as well which
1:36 um I totally agree with and we we tend
1:38 to We tend to there's a danger of
1:40 thinking that particularly paintings or
1:43 newspaper images of convicts that were
1:46 done at the time are the Real McCoy
1:49 whereas of course they are often very
1:52 strongly influenced by people's um
1:55 attitudes towards um convicts or people
1:58 of various classes or in different
1:59 people of different Sexes and so you
2:02 know using the originals doesn't
2:04 necessarily get us out of the minefield
2:07 hmm and Fran has also asked will the
2:11 images be marked saying that they're
2:13 produced by AI
I guess that is related
2:17 to what tool you're using
2:19 yes most definitely we will
2:24 um yes and um that's been
2:27 um we're certainly working going back
2:31 now and doing any images that we've uh
2:33 generated through the Ironclad
2:34 Sisterhood project we're going to
2:36 explicitly have I mean it says it on the
2:38 web page that they're AI but we're
2:40 actually going to put it on each
2:41 individual photo
as well so that if they
2:44 do get copied uh which I'm sure we've
2:47 all had that happen with you know people
2:49 copying things in online trees that at
2:52 least hopefully that will alert others
2:56 that they
2:57 um artificially intelligent intelligence
3:00 generated images
3:02 hmm
Youtube and transcript source:
Beware AI generated images of your criminal ancestors! #2
https://youtu.be/yhiCaXMadqk?si=3FGNzVZWBDVhjALp

RELATED POSTS main weblog

Marcus Clarke and Thomas Nevin at the Old Bell Hotel 1870

MARCUS CLARKE in Hobart, Tasmania 1874
THE OLD BELL HOTEL Elizabeth St. Hobart
THOMAS NEVIN's STUDIO 140 Elizabeth St. Hobart



State Library of Victoria
Title: Portrait photograph of Marcus Clarke in riding gear [picture].
Date(s): ca. 1866 [unattributed]
Description: 1 photographic print on carte de visite mount : albumen silver ; 10.3 x 6.3 cm.
Identifier(s): Accession no(s) H2011.89

Marcus Clarke at the Old Bell Hotel
In January 1920, the Old Bell Hotel in Elizabeth St. Hobart closed its doors for the last time. This notice repeated the story that Marcus Clarke had written parts of his famous novel For The Term of His Natural Life (1874) while imbibing in the parlour.



TRANSCRIPT
HOBART HOTELS CLOSED
HAUNT OF MARCUS CLARKE
Eight hotels delicensed recently by the Hobart Licensing Court closed their doors last night. One is the Old Bell, where Marcus Clarke is supposed to have written a portion of his famous novel, "For the Term of His Natural Life."
Source: HOBART HOTELS CLOSED. (1920, January 2). Daily Herald (Adelaide, SA : 1910 - 1924), p. 4. Retrieved September 21, 2014, from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article106495811.

By November 1921, plans were in place to demolish the hotel and in its place erect a two storey building renamed Old Bell Chambers housing a suite of shops and offices and a motor garage at rear, according to this report:

TRANSCRIPT
THE "OLD BELL" INN.
The demolition of another of the oldest public-houses in Hobart, known as the Old Bell Inn from the very early days of Hobart Town (as the city used to be called until comparatively recent years) is in progress, to make wav for new business premises, which will be styled "Old Bell Chambers". The most historic, and probably most interesting, reminiscence associated with the old building is the fact that Marcus Clarke is believed to have written his famous story, "For the Term of His Natural Life," in the main parlour of the inn. Though doubt is often cast on the possibility of this being actually true, owing to the author's reputedly short sojourn in Australia, it is more than probable that the original notes on which his narrative was framed at leisure were penned in the inn parlour on his return from a visit to the penal settlement at Eaglehawk Neck and Port Arthur. The site has a frontage on Elizabeth Street of 50 feet, widening to 70 feet at a depth of about 150 feet. The ground floor of the front portion will be occupied by shops, with suites of offices on the first floor, approached  by a stair-way leading direct from Elizabeth-street, and isolated from the shops by means of a reinforced concrete wall. The rear portion of the site will be occupied by a spacious motor garage, accessible by a right-of-way from Elizabeth-street The tender of Mr. A P McElwee has been accepted for the erection of the building, which will be carried out from the design prepared bv the architect, Mr R W Koch, who will supervise the construction.
Source: THE "OLD BELL" INN. (1921, November 4). The Mercury (Hobart, Tas. : 1860 - 1954), p. 4. Retrieved October 23, 2014, from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article23473314

As it seems that Thomas Nevin was partial to a drink, inebriation being the chief reason he was dismissed by the Police Committee from his position of Town Hall keeper in December 1880, the Old Bell Hotel would have been one of his preferred watering holes. The closest, however, was The Royal Standard Hotel located right next door to his studio, situated at 142 Elizabeth St on the corner of Patrick St, owned and operated by James Spence from 1862 to 1874.

Thomas Nevin was still alive in 1920 (d. 1923) when the hotel, known as the Old Bell, was delicensed, so he may have contributed to this story that Marcus Clarke drank there while writing his famous novel, published in installments from 1870 after a visit to the derelict prison at Port Arthur on the Tasman Peninsula. Marcus Clarke was a heavy drinker, a sufferer of dyspepsia and a disordered liver, dying at just 35 years old (1846-1881), whereas Thomas Nevin (1842-1923) was a Wesleyan who not only proved immune to the illnesses which beset his other family members on the voyage out on the Fairlie (1852), he lived to the distinguished age of 81 yrs, his beard still red and his eyes still clear. according to his grand children Eva and Hilda - children of his youngest son Albert and wife Emily Nevin - who were five and three yr olds, born 1917 and 1919 respectively, and who were still alive when this weblog went online in 2003.

Views of the Old Bell Hotel
The Old Bell Hotel (or Inn) was located at 132 Elizabeth Street, in one photograph, a streetscape ca. 1890, and at 146 Elizabeth St. in another photograph of the facade. In either case, it was just three doors from Thomas Nevin's studio, The City Photographic Establishment, his glass house and residence at 138-140 Elizabeth Street, Hobart, and on the same side of the street. Thomas Nevin acquired the business and premises from Alfred Bock in 1865, operating in the name of Nevin & Smith until 1868 with Robert Smith's departure for NSW and continued as a commercial photographer at the same premises until late 1875 when he was appointed to the civil service at the Hobart Town Hall with residency.

NEVIN's STEREOGRAPHS late 1860s
When Thomas Nevin took these two stereographs of his studio and shop front at 140 Elizabeth St. Hobart, shown at extreme right of the frame, the Old Bell Hotel would have been located at 132 Elizabeth St, just at the crest as the street dipped towards the River Derwent and visible at the distant perspectival centre in each frame. According to Alfred Bock's advertisement for an apprentice in 1863, the address of the City Photographic Establishment, 140 Elizabeth St. was "Three doors from Patrick-street, Hobart Town ..." .



Source: The Mercury, 7 July 1863.
The City Photographic Establishment at 140 Elizabeth St "Three doors from Patrick-street"
Alfred Bock’s new gallery was actually a glass house.



A view of Thomas Nevin's studio and shop, extreme right of frame, 140 Elizabeth St. Hobart
Stereograph by T. J. Nevin ca. 1867-70 of the City Photographic Establishment
The dark building next door at 138 Elizabeth St, Nevin's residence, was leased from A. E. Biggs
T. Nevin impress on lower centre of mount.
The Tasmanian Museum and Art Gallery Collection TMAG Ref: Q1994.56.12



Another view of Thomas Nevin's studio and shop, extreme right of frame, at 140 Elizabeth St. Hobart
The dark building next door at 138 Elizabeth St, Nevin's residence, was leased from A. E. Biggs
Stereograph by T. J. Nevin ca. 1867-1870 of the City Photographic Establishment, three doors from Patrick St,
TMAG Ref: Q1994-56-33 Verso blank


1890s-1920
This photograph (below, right click for large view) distinctly shows The Old Bell Hotel on the right hand side of Elizabeth St. if one is looking towards the wharves, with the address as No.132 Elizabeth St.



Title: Photograph - Elizabeth Street looking south (Brisbane Street) - Bridges Bros and The Bell Hotel at number 132
Description: 1 photographic print
Format: Photograph
ADRI: NS1013-1-820
Source: Archives Office of Tasmania

But this photograph shows the Old Bell at 146 Elizabeth St, Hobart:



Source: TAHO Ref:PH40-1-93c



Title: Photograph - "Old Bell Hotel", Hobart - interior of bar [n.d.]
Description: 1 photographic print
Format: Photograph
ADRI: PH40-1-94
Source: Archives Office of Tasmania

When the photograph (below, top left) was taken of three boys standing outside the Old Bell Hotel, the authors of this article published in the Mercury Supplement series Cheers! on Hobart's hotels in 2005 stated that the hotel's address by then was 146 to 150 Elizabeth St. Hobart.



The Old Bell Hotel at what is now 146-150 Elizabeth t. Hobart
J. V. Peck licensee; the property at Nos 136-140 in his wife's name Catherine Peck by 1886
Source: Mercury Supplement Cheers, Friday August 26, 2005
Photo copyright © KLW NFC 2019 Private Collection

Marcus Clarke's sources
If the story about the Old Bell is factual, propinquity alone would have brought Thomas Nevin and Marcus Clarke together, and to their mutual satisfaction, given the journalistic background of John Nevin snr, Thomas' father, and Thomas Nevin's involvement with photographing the prisoner and ex-prisoner population. The Nevins would have given Marcus Clarke a ready source of information regarding police and prisoners at the Hobart Gaol one street away from the Old Bell Hotel. Thomas Nevin may have introduced Marcus Clarke to William Robert Giblin, Thomas Nevin's family solicitor, who was the Attorney-General and later, Premier, and he may have also introduced Marcus Clarke to Maria Nairn, the widow of William Edward Nairn, sheriff of Hobart from 1857 until his death in 1868. Maria Nairn had leased an acre of land to John Nevin, next to the Franklin Museum at Kangaroo Valley, not far from Clarke's lodgings. These prototypes served Marcus Clarke's fiction, along with the officials "of position" who allowed him to view prison records at Hobart, Town on his request:
When at Hobart Town I had asked an official of position to allow me to see the records, and – in consideration of the Peacock – he was obliging enough to do so. There I found set down, in various handwritings, the history of some strange lives… and glancing down the list, spotted with red ink for floggings, like a well printed prayer-book …



Source: Marcus Clarke, THE SKETCHER. (1873, August 2). The Australasian (Melbourne, Vic. : 1864 – 1946), p. 5. Retrieved September 21, 2014, from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article137581230



THE LAST HOPE.Book III, Chapter XIII (page 290)
Image taken from Marcus Clarke, For the Term of his Natural Life
WL Crowther Library,
State Library of Tasmania
Source: Colonialism and its Aftermath

The Preface
Marcus Clarke's Preface to His Natural Life,
First Published: 1870. Source: http://adc.library.usyd.edu.au/data-2/p00023.pdf
PREFACE
The convict of fiction has been hitherto shown only at the beginning or at the end of his career. Either his exile has been the mysterious end to his misdeeds, or he has appeared upon the scene to claim interest by reason of an equally unintelligible love of crime acquired during his experience in a penal settlement.
Charles Reade has drawn the interior of a house of correction in England, and Victor Hugo has shown how a French convict fares after the fulfilment of his sentence. But no writer — so far as I am aware — has attempted to depict the dismal condition of a felon during his term of transportation.
I have endeavoured in “His Natural Life” to set forth the working and results of an English system of transportation carefully considered and carried out under official supervision; and to illustrate in the manner best calculated, as I think, to attract general attention, the inexpediency of again allowing offenders against the law to be herded together in places remote from the wholesome influence of public opinion, and to be submitted to a discipline which must necessarily depend for its just administration upon the personal character and temper of their gaolers.
Some of the events narrated are doubtless tragic and terrible; but I hold it needful to my purpose to record them, for they are events which have actually occurred, and which, if the blunders which produce them be repeated, must infallibly occur again. It is true that the British Government have ceased to deport the criminals of England, but the method of punishment, of which that deportation was a part, is still in existence. Port Blair is a Port Arthur filled with Indian-men instead of Englishmen; and, within the last year, France has established, at New Caledonia, a penal settlement which will, in the natural course of things, repeat in its annals the history of Macquarie Harbour and of Norfolk Island.
M.C.
MELBOURNE, AUSTRALIA
Watch The Movie (1929)
Watch the full version here at YouTube -

Edwin Barnard at the NLA with Nevin's convict photographs



Thomas J. Nevin's mugshot of prisoner Denis Dogherty, 1870s,
Surname is spelled Dougherty by Edwin Barnard in Exiled: The Port Arthur Convict Photographs NLA (2010). Photos copyright © KLW NFC 2011 ARR. Watermarked.


Video excerpt from:




ABC TV (Aust) news report by Siobhan Heanue, 2 April 2011.
NB: this report contains unfactual and erroneous statements by both the journalist and interviewee.

For authentic and accurate research, see this article which reviews the National Library of Australia's book published with author accreditation to Edwin Barnard, titled  Exiled: The Port Arthur Convict Photographs (2010), noting specific examples of Barnard's suppositions, prevarications, errors and omissions.

Thomas FRANCIS was photographed by T. J. Nevin on 6th February 1874

See also:
And search convicts' names with T. J. Nevin's photographs at these weblogs:
See also this critique of the book  by Tim Causer,  Bentham Project, University College London.

The interviewee Edwin Barnard in this ABC news report poses here as an expert on the Tasmanian convicts photographs taken and produced by commercial and police photographer Thomas J. NEVIN in the 1870s. Original duplicates of these same mugshots held at the NLA which were made by Thomas Nevin and his brother Constable John Nevin for the police are held in other public institutions (TMAG, QVMAG, AOT, SLNSW, PCHS) and private collections.

George Langley and Denis Dogherty are two prisoners mentioned in this excerpt from an ABC TV (Aust) news report delivered by Siobhan Heanue, 2 April 2011. Langley's and Dogherty's photos are just two of thousands of prisoner mugshots taken by the Nevin brothers, professional photographer Thomas Nevin (1842-1923) and his brother Constable John Nevin (1852-1891) at the Hobart Gaol between 1872 and 1886. About 300 of their Tasmanian prisoner photographs survive in public collections. Barnard's various unsubstantiated assertions - eg. that Denis Dogherty never saw his own mugshot - underscore the shallow modus operandi which characterises his self-presentation as an expert. Edwin Barnard simply repeats the simplistic nuances of a faded postmodern discourse on power marshalled in the 1990s by photohistorians such as Helen Ennis and Isobel Crombie.

HIDDEN in FULL VIEW
Barnard claims to be the "author" of the recent publication featuring Nevin's prisoner mugshots titled Exiled: The Port Arthur Convict Photographs (2010) sponsored by the National Library of Australia, but the facts remain and are widely known that Barnard liberally appropriated materials three years ago from our weblogs and albums documenting Thomas J. Nevin's commercial and police work. The weblogs have presented accurate research about Nevin's commission with the Hobart Gaol and Municipal Police Office online since 2005, yet Barnard used the research without due contact or courtesy in any form. Earlier in the interview Barnard claims he "discovered" and "unearthed" these mugshots despite and in the face of their public visibility since 1977 when they were exhibited at the QVMAG, researched and curated by experts, and despite the constant online visibility at the Archives Office Tasmania and the National Library of Australia since the early 1990s with full and unequivocal attribution to T.J. Nevin.

On April 8th, 2011, Edwin Barnard made an appearance at the National Library of Australia during a weekend conference called True Stories: Writing History. In his talk, Barnard conceded that the so-called "Port Arthur convict photographs" which feature in the NLA publication Exiled: The Port Arthur Convict Photographs (2010) were taken at the Hobart Gaol and not at Port Arthur, though he did not explicitly name Thomas Nevin as the photographer, despite the facts available, which would have redeemed him to some extent. But then, when requested by an audience member to recite what he had written about the convict Denis Dogherty, he quoted verbatim the material we published on these weblogs way back in 2006 and duly basked in the audience's warm response. It's a sad comment, but there are self-promoting hacks such as Barnard (and others like Julia Clark) who crave love and validation through coveting the legacy of others.



Thomas FRANCIS was photographed by T.J. NEVIN on 6th Feb 1874

Thomas Francis was discharged from Port Arthur, per the first notice (below) in the police gazette dated 31st January - 4th February, 1874. Note that no physical details of the prisoner had been recorded by the police in Hobart up to that date, 4th February 1874, because he had not re-offended and not yet photographed on discharge per regulations. A second notice appeared in the police gazette one week later, dated 6th February 1874, which included his age - 62 yrs, height - 5'5" - color of hair - "brown" and distinguishing marks, viz. bullet mark on left leg, bayonet mark on thumb, scar on chin. These details were written and recorded when Thomas J. Nevin photographed the prisoner Thomas Francis on that date - 6th February 1874 - at the Office of Inspector of Police, Hobart Town Hall.



NLA CATALOGUE NOTES (incorrect information)
nla.pic-vn4269870 PIC P1029/14 LOC Album 935 Thomas Francis, Ly. [i.e. Lady] Franklin 4, taken at Port Arthur, 1874 [picture] 1874. 1 photograph on carte-de-visite mount : albumen ; 9.4 x 5.6 cm. on mount 10.5 x 6.3 cm. Part of Convict portraits, Port Arthur, 1874 [picture]

Hundreds of these 1870s mugshots of Tasmanian prisoners were transcribed and displayed in museum exhibitions in Tasmania between 1915 and 1934 with the generic date "1874" and place "Port Arthur" regardless of each prisoner's individual criminal history, some of whom had never been incarcerated there. The National Library of Australia catalogue note records only what was written on the verso of this and dozens of other photographs in their collection of the so-called "Convicts, Port Arthur 1874" when they were acquired by donation in Canberra in 1964 (Dan Sprod papers NLA MS 2320 1.5.64 Missionary history) and in 1985 (per interview with John McPhee, NPG, 1984). Most of these photographs are duplicates made by T. J. Nevin from his negative of a single sitting with the prisoner, taken for use by police.

Thomas FRANCIS was photographed by T.J. Nevin, the only photographer and the only commercial photographer contracted to the Municipal Police Office and Attorney-General's Office in the early 1870s to provide the police with prisoner identification mugshots. The photograph was taken at the MPO, Hobart Town Hall, between the 2nd and 6th February 1874, and not at the Port Arthur prison. This prisoner was one of three men photographed on that date: John MORAN and Thomas SAUNDERS were also discharged and photographed in Hobart by T.J. Nevin between 4th-6th February 1874. The carte-de-visite of Moran is held at the National Library of Australia, and a print from Nevin's original negative of Moran is held at the Queen Victoria Museum and Art Gallery. The cdv of Saunders is also held at the QVMAG:



[Above and below]:
John Moran, photographed on discharge by T.J. Nevin at the MPO Hobart Town Hall on 6th February 1874. The print from Nevin's glass negative of John Moran is held at the QVMAG; the cdv in an oval mount is held at the NLA.





[Above]: Thomas Saunders, photographed on discharge at the MPO Hobart Town Hall by T.J. Nevin on 6th February, 1874. This cdv is held at the QVMAG and numbered recto "133" in the late 20th century when the QVMAG copied hundreds from their collection for dispersal to the Archives Office and Tasmanian Museum and Art Gallery in Hobart .

POLICE RECORDS



[Above]: the first police gazette notice for Thomas Francis (and John Moran), received from Port Arthur and discharged between 31st January and 4th February. No physical details were recorded for either prisoner.


Source: Tasmania Reports of Crime Information for Police, Gov't printer.

[Above]: the second police gazette notice of Thomas Francis (including John Moran and Thomas Saunders), discharged from the Office of Inspector of Police, Hobart Town, dated 6th February 1874. Full physical details were transcribed and gazetted only after Thomas Francis (and John Moran)  reported for discharge, and received an FS on discharge - Free in Servitude - in Francis' case, and a TL - ticket of leave - in the case of Moran and Saunders. All three men - Thomas Francis, John Moran and Thomas Saunders - were  photographed by Thomas J. Nevin at the Office of Inspector of Police, which was located in the Hobart Town Hall no later than the 6th February and no earlier than the 31st January - 4th February 1874, in Hobart, and not at Port Arthur.

DO NOT BELIEVE WHAT YOU READ or HEAR from Edwin Barnard
Edwin Barnard claims to be the author of a recent publication sponsored by the National Library of Australia titled Exiled: The Port Arthur Convict Photographs (Edwin Barnard, NLA 2010).



This extract about the photograph of Thomas FRANCIS appears on page 83 of Exiled: The Port Arthur Convict Photographs (Edwin Barnard NLA 2010).

There is not much that is authentic or even sincere about this book. The "story" as told by Barnard is from the viewpoint of the benign coloniser. The author claims (on back cover) not to have convict heritage, but as if to reassure those who do, he lives in hope of finding one in his family one day (yeah, right). Barnard's previous publication is generically very similar: a Reader's Digest of "Antarctica: great stories from the Frozen Continent."

See this critique of the book by Tim Causer (2011) Bentham Project, University College London.

Interviewed on ABC radio (twice) in October 2010 (Radio National 14 October 2010; RA W.A. Port Hedland ) Barnard stated that he merely "stumbled across" these Tasmanian prisoner photographs, omitting to mention, of course, that they had been online at the NLA and the Archives Office of Tasmania for more than a decade (since the 1990s at the National Library), and that he had made ready use of the original research we have provided here online (since 2005) about each photograph. One of the first we documented and discussed was that of prisoner Denis Dogherty (because of Anthony Trollope's account) yet listening to Barnard - who chose to talk at length about Dogherty - you would believe that he alone had unearthed these fascinating facts, such is Barnard's tenor and "excitement" . When asked who photographed the prisoners, his answer was even more disingenuous if not downright arrogant - he failed to mention Nevin by name, dismissing him simply as "some guy" who was a commercial photographer. Yet Barnard's primary source of information about Dogherty was from a page copied from Geoff Lennox (1994), held in Thomas J. Nevin's Photographer File at the National Library of Australia:



NLA CATALOGUE
[Nevin, T. J. : photography related ephemera material collected by the National Library of Australia]
Bib ID 3821234
Dogherty's photograph attributed to T. J. Nevin
Held at the NLA in Nevin's file
Photo taken at the National Library of Australia, 6 Feb 2015
Photos copyright KLW NFC 2015 ARR

Interviewed again by ABC TV journalist Siobhan Heanue on 22 February 2011 (video on page) and filmed at the NLA with the prisoner mugshots laid out before him, Edwin Barnard repeated the egotistical nonsense that he "discovered" and "unearthed" the convict photographs. Note Siobhan Heanue's error when she states in the video prologue that these mugshots "were taken in the 1850s at Port Arthur" - a comment which betrays ignorance of the historical subject she is reporting.

The release at this time of this book,  Exiled: The Port Arthur Convict Photographs (2010) would lead the public to believe the authors (Edwin Barnard with Hamish Maxwell-Stewart) have published the latest word on the 84 mugshots of Tasmanian prisoners - or to use the NLA's aesthetic term - "convict portraits" - held at the NLA, the majority of which were exhibited there correctly in 1982/1995 and placed online as photographs taken by professional photographer and civil servant Thomas J. Nevin, complete with verso inscriptions, However, as we have painstakingly demonstrated here with original police records and with other archival documents and newspaper accounts on these Thomas J. Nevin weblogs, these prisoners were photographed by Thomas J. Nevin and his brother Constable John Nevin at the Supreme Court Hobart, the Hobart Gaol, and the MPO Hobart Town Hall between 1871 and 1884. Edwin Barnard's research is far too generalized, already out of date, and of no use to photohistorians. As an author, Edwin Barnard has little credibility and should not be referenced as an authority.

On page 83, the so-called "author" of Exiled: The Port Arthur Convict Photographs erroneously states that Thomas Francis was released in March 1875, and that he was 58 years old. Thomas Francis was released on 6th February 1874, and was 62 years old, per police records. Who are you going to believe? The original police record which you can actually SEE here or a vague statement in a glossy vanity publication? And the publication is all vanity and bleeding heart for men who were essentially habitual criminals, whose second and repeat offences, in many cases involving rape and murder, earned them a further term of imprisonment and a mugshot by Nevin at the Hobart Gaol. Would men with similar criminal records from the 1970s receive the same loving treatment? Of course not. Yet the 1870s prisoner photographs were taken for the same reasons and in the same circumstances as those dictated by police regulations today.

Edwin Barnard and the book's historical consultant Hamish Maxwell-Stewart (both British-born, the latter an academic who is best described as the tail wagging the dog with the misinformation he is intent on spawning about Nevin's attribution) of  Exiled: The Port Arthur Convict Photographs have a barely concealed agenda: to encourage the reading of criminality by viewers into a man's physical features, mediated with text and image amidst the echoes of phrenology and the malodour of eugenics. The cliched association of the term "PORT ARTHUR" with these prisoners' mugshots is the honeypot trap with which the authors hope to attract readers.The accompanying biographical narrative to each man's image was mustered by the authors from transportation records, from a few newspaper articles and from a few earlier publications. Information which we had chosen not to publish on these weblogs also appears as lacunae in their book. The tenor of the biographies is one which pleads to forgive these men, to see them even as “pioneers” - a laughable notion. They were pioneers of crime for the police, certainly, because they were habitual offenders and recidivists with long criminal careers, but little else. Each man's entry is plumped up with irrelevant colorful graphica to render the whole product as an unproblematic, glossy coffee-table paperback aimed at children. Pages decorated with a lot of pretty paintings bear little if any connection to the prisoner's photograph despite the claim that the book ostensibly deals with PHOTOGRAPHS, i.e. objects which are nothing more than cardboard artefacts and only recently acquired by a national institution, the National Library which has its own history of misuse and abuse of these items, but which - as photographs - had a real history of PRODUCTION in the hands of their PRODUCER, the very real photographer T.J. Nevin. A more appropriate title for this book would be:

OUTCASTS: Biographies of 55 Transported Convicts to Van Diemen's Land, with later police photographs taken by T.J. Nevin.

There is no guarantee that the man in each photograph in this book belonged to the name assigned to him, and that is a real dilemma for anyone wishing to trace their convict ancestry. A case in point involves the descendants of  businessman Henry Jones, founder of IXL Jams, who have been led to believe that the mugshot of prisoner Elijah Elton (pp 161-171) who used the alias John Jones, was their ancestor.

These photographs originally taken by Nevin were either loose duplicates or those removed from the criminal's prison record sheet and Hobart Gaol registers ca. 1915, probably by Edward Searle and John Watt Beattie, who salvaged them from the Sheriff's Office at the Hobart Gaol to display them in Beattie's "Port Arthur Museum" in Hobart. They reproduced prints from Nevin's original glass negatives, according to a visitor from South Australia in 1916, and copied others including the cdvs, which were acquired by the QVMAG on Beattie's death in 1930. Beattie had full government endorsement when Port Arthur, renamed as Carnarvon, was heavily promoted interstate as Tasmania's premier tourist attraction, These mugshots catered to the tourist's contemporary fascination with character typologies, phrenology and eugenics, and the Tasmanian "stain".

The handwritten transcription across the versos of many of these prisoners' photographs  - "Taken at Port Arthur 1874" was the work of the second archivist to catalogue the collection sometime between 1915 and 1934. The first archivist, whoever that was, who began organizing these cdvs printed in oval mounts into a collection just before 1915 and probably to make copies, omitted any reference to Port Arthur, i.e. "Taken at Port Arthur" does NOT appear on the versos of the first three cartes numbered 1 to 3, those cartes of prisoners George Nutt, William Yeomans and Bewley Tuck. Port Arthur was not the main place of incarceration by July 1873: just 40 prisoners were left there when the report on closure of the prison was tabled in Parliament on 15th July 1873 and those prisoners were returned to Hobart by late 1873. Nevin had already photographed sixty (60) transferees from Port Arthur by that date, some previously as early as 1871 at their Supreme Court trials in Hobart before they were sent to Port Arthur. The constant mantra about these photographs being "portraits of Port Arthur convicts" is completely misleading. Read the meme in the title - "PHOTOGRAPHS" - they were police photographs taken for and used by the Municipal Police Office, Hobart in the course of daily surveillance and prosecution.





Above: page 12, Exiled, with recto and verso of carte of prisoner Thomas Francis, photo by T.J. Nevin, 6th Feb. 1874.

The number "231" written on the verso of this carte is NOT a number allocated to the prisoner, as the note above suggests: it is the number used by the copyist and cataloguist in the early 1900s for archiving, and for exhibiting in the 1934 exhibition to commemorate Beattie's bequest to the Launceston City Council and Queen Victoria Museum, Launceston,

Attractive but by no means accurate, this publication called Exiled: The Port Arthur Convict Photographs (Barnard 2010) creates more problems that it resolves and no doubt that is the result hoped for by the supporters of the fantasy about the non-photographer A.H. Boyd. The notes about Thomas J. Nevin on page 15 prevaricate upon his unique legacy with the usual idiocies about the non-photographer A.H. Boyd quoting the desperate and deliberate falsifications from the lamentable and covetous Julia Clark. Many phrases from these Nevin weblogs can be traced throughout the texts, both the general notes and notes specific to each photograph, yet no courtesy request was received by us from Edwin Barnard or the NLA. The information one would expect in such a book with such a subtitle "The Port Arthur Convict Photographs" should include a biography of the photographer (Nevin's has been online since 2005), the types of cameras he used, his studio practice and assistants, his methods of producing a carte-de-visite in an oval mount from his glass negative, government documents detailing his contractual engagement and civil service, the police requirements and judicial regulations, and all the rest about the reproduction, copying and distribution of Nevin's prisoner photographs by later photographers and archivists from the early 1900s. Those key topoi have unfolded on these Thomas J. Nevin weblogs since 2005 and are exclusively copyrighted to the weblog authors.



Note on Thomas J. Nevin, p.15, Exiled; The Port Arthur Convict Photographs. the possibility that not only Thomas Nevin but also his brother Constable John Nevin at the Hobart Gaol worked for police as police photographers does not cross the author's mind.

For these reasons, any attempt by the National Library of Australia in this publication (or any other) at the diminishment of Nevin's technical and official achievements as the only police photographer of the 1870s (assisted by his brother Constable John Nevin) who produced these prisoner photographs in Tasmania has to be viewed in the context of the fishbowl politics of the National Library of Australia. In other words, Edwin Barnard's claims that he has written a book about PHOTOGRAPHS are irrelevant in the context of the history of police photography. The rest of the world's assessment of T.J. Nevin as "the photographer of the earliest surviving Australian prisoner mugshots" is more than ever consolidated by the NLA's failings as a result.







[Above]: pages 82- 83, Exiled; The Port Arthur Convict Photographs (NLA 2010) with errors about the prisoner Thomas Francis. Photos copyright © KLW NFC 2010 ARR.

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