Photographic portrait of John Pascoe Fawkner

[Circa 1870]. Albumen print photograph, carte de visite format, 104 x 64 mm (mount), recto and verso with imprint of ‘H. Glenny, Dublin and Melbourne Portrait Rooms, Main Road, Ballarat East, Victoria, Australia’, the posthumously published albumen print taken from the original image by Melbourne photographer Thomas Foster Chuck; in fine condition.

John Pascoe Fawkner (1792-1869) is regarded, along with John Batman, as one of the founders of Melbourne. Fawkner was the leader of the first group of free settlers in Port Phillip which arrived from Van Diemen’s Land in the Enterprize in October 1835. Fawkner also published Melbourne’s first newspaper, the Melbourne Advertiser; opened its first hotel; and later served as a member of the Victorian Legislative Council.

Several photographic portraits of John Pascoe Fawkner, taken by various Melbourne studios, are known. Another example of the present image in carte de visite format, taken around 1869 by Thomas Foster Chuck, is held in the collection of the State Library of Victoria (H5056/3). The SLV example was published posthumously and is dated 1872. The goldfields photographer Henry Glenny presumably purchased the right to publish Chuck’s image some time after Fawkner’s death, and would most likely have sold copies of this head-and-shoulders profile portrait from his Ballarat studio as commemorative souvenirs.