Thomas J. Nevin and Samuel Clifford (1827-1890) were close friends and colleagues over a period dating from ca. 1865 to Clifford’s death in 1890. This carte bearing the handwritten inscription “Clifford and Nevin, Hobart Town” is one of several in private and public collections. Scans courtesy © The Private Collection of John & Robyn McCullagh … More Clifford & Nevin, and the coloured cartes
The six cartes-de-visite of Tasmanian convicts in oval mounts published in The Australian People (J. Jupp, ed, 2001) were reproduced from the National Library of Australia’s (Pictorial) collection of Thomas J. Nevin’s convict portraits . Some are dated 1874 on the verso, with the inscription “Taken at Port Arthur, 1874”, which now appears to be touristic spin rather than fact, written decades later in a cataloguist’s hand probably by Edward Searle while working at John Watt Beattie’s convictaria museum and studio in Hobart between 1911-1915. The majority of extant prisoner photographs in public collections – more than 300 – were taken by Thomas J. Nevin (and his brother Constable John Nevin) at the Supreme Court and Hobart Gaol on the occasion of the prisoner’s incarceration and discharge between 1871-1884. … More The Australian People: six prisoner cdv’s by T. J. Nevin
