Studio portrait of Mr. and Mrs. John Brook. Sydney, late 1880s.

Silver albumen print photograph, cabinet card format, 160 x 115 mm, recto of mount with gilt imprint of Creelman, Sydney Arcade, Sydney, N.S.W.; the verso has a contemporary inscription ink with name Jno. Brook; the print has excellent clarity and good tonal range (some insignificant mottling in the negative); the gilt-edged mount is in excellent condition.

The male sitter is identified as John Brook. A thorough search of Sydney newspapers of the late 1880s suggests he is likely to be John Charles Brook, pharmacist of Church Hill (Wynyard), who in July 1887 escaped with his life after he was viciously assaulted (he was garrotted!) and robbed by three assailants near the corner of King and Kent Streets. We have not been able to fully identify his elegant and strikingly beautiful wife, who is pictured in this superb portrait holding a fan.