From the TMAG Collection: Reproduced from page 36 of
Tasmanian Photographers 1840-1940: A Directory (TMAG 1995)
Click on image for large view
On the left, the verso of convict Job Smith’s carte bears the simple inscription:
Job Smith Alias Campbell Alias Boodle
and in a very different hand, the verso of Samuel [or Emanuel] Blore’s carte bears the familiar inscription which appears uniformly across dozens of these “Port Arthur convict” cartes:
Samuel Blore per Ld Petre Taken at Port Arthur 1874
Blore’s carte bears the number “134″ on recto. Job’s carte has no numbering recto or verso. Clearly, these convicts were photographed at a different time and place, and the history of each carte is very different. Their criminal history can give some indication of the likely time, place and circumstance of capture. While both convicts’ transportation details are listed in the Archives Office of Tasmania Convicts Records data base, only Smith’s fate is known:
65694 Smith Job 26 Dec 1844 Sir Robert Peel 09 Sep 1844 London
5559 Blore Emanuel 15 Oct 1843 Lord Petre 07 Jul 1843 London
Job Smith was executed on 31st May, 1875. The Penitentiary Chapel Historic Site website gives this summary (after Ian Brand):
JOB SMITH - 31st May 1875
Job Smith was a prisoner at Port Arthur, who had served most of his sentence by 1875 and had conducted himself well while there.
Margaret Ayres was a housemaid and in the service of Rev. Mr. Hayward the Church of England clergyman there. Shortly before 5 p.m. on 27th February, 1875, she went into the bush to search for Hayward’s cow.
On the way she met Smith and asked him if he had seen the cow and he pointed out the direction in which it had gone. She noticed that Smith was following her so she began to go back telling him she was afraid of snakes. She then claimed Smith made improper advances to her and when she fell trying to get away, he raped her.
Smith was charged with rape in the Supreme Court on 12th May, 1875.
The defence claimed there was no evidence of rape, that any of six prisoners were free to commit the offence and that Ayres had not noticed her assailant had lost the use of one arm as Smith had.
The jury rejected these claims and found Smith guilty and he was sentenced to death.
Smith went to the gallows on 31st May, 1875 declaring his innocence, but this contradicted a written statement he left with Father Beechinor.
A letter in the “Mercury” the following day questioned whether rape should be a capital offence or whether Tasmania should not follow England’s example and find another punishment for that crime. Smith was the last person to hang for rape in Tasmania.
No information appears for Blore at the website Graves of Tasmania nor for Smith’s aliases.
Job Smith’s carte is the original police photograph taken by Thomas Nevin on Smith’s transfer from Port Arthur to the Hobart Gaol between the date the crime was committed at Port Arthur on February 27th 1875 and the Supreme Court conviction on the 12th May 1875. His transfer was by government schooner Harriet in the company of constables and the incumbent civil commandant at Port Arthur, Dr Coverdale (January 1st 1874 - September 1877), as was Coverdale’s practice from May 1874 onwards. The journey entailed a risk of escape in transit; a photograph would have been seen as some insurance against a succesful attempt.
Another strong possibility is that Nevin took the photograph of Job Smith at the Hobart Gaol on the 13th May, in the course of his routine prison photography, and in easy reach of his studio one street away. The carte would have served three purposes: attachment to the prisoner’s record; general prison documentation; and sale to the public. Records of executed men required more thorough documention, not least because of public interest. Smith’s case was a cause celebre. The Mercury ran editorial commentary and letters from the public throughout May and early June 1875 concerning his innocence or guilt, questioning the mess of evidence, and Tasmania’s continued application of capital punishment laws.
The last hours of Job Smith were reported in The Mercury on June 1st, 1875, and not without a note of pathos (some words from the original on microfilm are illegible):
EXECUTION AT THE HOBART TOWN GAOL
The condemned criminal, Job Smith, recently tried, found guilty, and sentenced to death for a criminal assault, under brutal circumstances, on the girl Margaret Ayres, at Port Arthur,forfeited his life inside the Hobart Town Gaol yesterday morning.
At 8 o’clock , Smith, accompanied by Father D. F. X. Beechinor (the clergyman who attended him since his condemnation) and Mr Rothwell (Under-Sheriff) left the condemned cell, and proceeded to the place of execution, Father Beechinor being engaged in prayer along the way. Besides Mr. Atkins (the governor of the gaol), representatives of the Press, and a body of police, there were only two other individuals present.
From the cell to the gallows, Smith betrayed no physical emotion, his step being steady, and his demeanour apparently composed. On arriving at the drop ,the Under-Sheriff asked the unfortunate man if he had anything to say. Smith replied, ” I am not guilty ; I am an innocent man.”The Under-Sheriff then read the following written statement : -” I was born at Bristol on the 23rd of November, 1819, and was a Protestant all my life. Became a Roman Catholic upon receiving sentence of death. I have left with my [spiritual] director a statement, which, in his discretion, I request him to publish wholly or in part.”
The usual preliminaries having been arranged, … a g… signal from the Under-Sheriff, performed his duty, and the malefactor died without any apparent physical pain.It may be mentioned that Smith left a written document with Father Beechinor, which contains a statement in direct contradiction to his dying words.
During portions of Sunday night, Smith manifested much mental uneasiness, but as night wore on he became calmer. At an early hour of the morning, Smith requested to be served with some bread, cheese, and beer. The request was complied with, but at the time he left his cell for execution his refreshment remained untouched.
The distinctive black border of Job Smith’s carte, which sets it apart from Nevin’s originals of other convicts, accords with the convention in Victorian times of setting a photograph of a deceased person inside a black border. Memorial photographs on Queen Victoria’s death are a typical example. This carte could have been reprinted by Nevin at his business, The City Photographic Establishment, where his trade stamp in use in 1875 - “T.J. Nevin” - included the government insignia, signifying a combined income from private clients and government contract. Offered on sale to the public, Smith’s image of infamy would serve as a reminder of the swift course of justice. Given that photographs were not printed in newspapers in 1875, the Press in attendance may have used this carte of Job Smith as an adjunct to sales.
The handwriting on the verso of Smith’s carte is similar to the handwriting on another of Nevin’s photographs held at the TMAG - the
landscape of Melville Street under snow, inscribed “W. Hobart, July 1868″ . Both inscriptions give very specific information which indicates the photographer’s first-hand knowledge.
The carte of Samuel or Emanuel Blore was probably reprinted, inscribed verso, and numbered by Beattie in the 1900s for display and sale at his convictaria museum in Hobart. It is also a reproduction from Nevin’s original, a tourist artefact. As no information about Blore’s fate has surfaced, his identification photograph falls into the category of “Taken at Port Arthur, 1874“, and although this is a possiblity, he may have been photographed at Richmond prison or at any one of the receiving aslyums in Hobart between 1874 and the closure of the Port Arthur prison in 1877.
Both photographs are from the Tasmanian Museum and Art Gallery Collection, and appear on the page of their publication Tasmanian Photographers 1840-1940: A Directory where the writer Chris Long attempts to attribute both photographs to commandant A.H. Boyd. Since Boyd - who was not a photographer - had departed the Port Arthur site a full year before Job Smith’s crime and conviction, this is clearly inadmissable.
Another carte of Job Smith exists in the National Library of Australia’s collection of Tasmanian convict portraits by Thomas J. Nevin. It is one of two hand-coloured photographs of convicts by Nevin, and it is catalogued under one of Job Smith’s aliases - William Campbell:
nla.pic-vn4270353
1 photograph on carte-de-visite mount : albumen, hand col. ; 9.4 x 5.6 cm., on mount 10.4 x 6.4 cm.
The NLA catalogue entry would seem to indicate that there is the inscription on verso, “Taken at Port Arthur, 1874” but this is either a handwritten batch edit from an archivist in the 1900s or by the NLA cataloguists on acquisition of their collection in the 1980s. Inspection of the verso is necessary to ascertain exactly where, when and why it is catalogued at the NLA with the date “1874″. Likewise, the same image held at the TMAG needs to be examined to ascertain if it is also hand-coloured. In either event, it is the same single image of this convict with several aliases, taken by Nevin once and once only; one or both items in these collections may be copies, and there were probably many more in existence at the time of Job Smith’s - aka William Campbell’s - hanging, given the notoreity of the case. Nevin’s reputation for hand-tinted photography was reported in The Mercury, December 4th, 1880. See this entry for more information on Nevin’s coloured convict portraits at the NLA.
