Signed studio portrait of the controversial anti-Catholic crusader Charles Chiniquy, known as “the Canadian Luther”. Melbourne, 1879.

Albumen print photograph, carte de visit format, 105 x 64 mm (mount); recto inscribed in ink across the bottom margin ‘Yours in Christ, C. Chiniquy’; verso with the gilt imprint of ‘Bardwell, Melbourne’; in very good condition.

‘Charles Chiniquy was a well-known Catholic priest in North America from 1833 to 1858, before being expelled and joining the Presbyterian church. He spent the next forty years lecturing around the world against the dogmas of his former church, and arrived in Hobart for a week’s visit in June 1879. At his second public lecture, a riot occurred when hundreds of Catholic opponents forced their way into the hall. After further abandonments and because of fears for audience safety at the final lecture, 150 special constables and 400 members of the Volunteer Force were added to the regular police and military to ensure the peace was kept. Although there were many protesters outside the Town Hall (the Mercury estimated 4000), this show of strength allowed the meeting to run safely.’ – Graham Vertigan, The Companion to Tasmanian History (https://www.utas.edu.au/library/companion_to_tasmanian_history/C/Chiniquy%20affair.htm)

Prior to his Tasmanian visit Chiniquy had conducted an extensive lecture tour of Sydney and regional New South Wales in the second half of 1878 and early part of 1879. He arrived in Melbourne – where contemporary newspaper reports indicate that he received a much less hostile reception than he would in Hobart some months later – at the beginning of February, 1879, which is most likely when this portrait of him was taken by Bardwell.

Rare. Only three other examples of this carte de visite traced in Australian institutions (SLNSW; ACU Library; Libraries Tasmania), all of which bear a similar inscription to the one offered here.