[WINE] Front view of a colonial cottage showing rows of neatly planted grape vines. Melbourne (or Beechworth?), 1869-70.

Albumen print photograph, carte de visite format, 64 x 103 mm (mount); recto of mount inscribed in ink at top edge: ‘William’s cottage’; verso with the imprint of ‘American and Australian Photographic Company. Melbourne Office, 73 Little Collins St. East’; both print and mount are in excellent condition.

The American & Australian Photographic Company was the Melbourne arm of the American & Australasian Photographic Company (note the subtle difference in wording) established in Sydney in 1869 by Beaufoy Merlin. It was run by James P. Lind, who – like Merlin and his assistant Charles Bayliss – specialised in taking outdoor views in carte de visite format, rather than studio portraits. Based on the evidence of Lind’s surviving photographs, the bulk of his business – from the late 1860s right up into the 1880s – evidently came from photographing private residences, often with the owners posed outside.

The 73 Collins Street East address is the earliest one used by Lind on an American & Australian Photographic Company carte de visite back mark. The back mark is certainly rare, as contemporary Melbourne newspaper advertisements tell us that the firm had its headquarters at this address only in the period 1869-1870. Not only is the present example the only one we have sighted, but its relatively low negative number ‘3019’ indicates it was probably taken in 1869 rather than 1870. Davies & Stanbury (The Mechanical Eye in Australia) were not even aware that the firm was active at such an early date, listing its first address as 63 Bourke Street, from 1871.

This intriguing view of a cottage with neatly planted rows of vines would seem to be evidence of small-scale domestic wine production in Victoria in the 1860s. Although the cottage was probably located in the greater Melbourne area, there is also a possibility the photograph was taken in the Beechworth district.

A notice in the Ovens and Murray Advertiser (Beechworth), 25 September 1869, reported that ‘A company known as the American and Australian Photographic Company, having offices in Melbourne and Sydney, is about to send a representative to this district’.

A few days later, on 30 September 1869, this was followed up by an advertisement in the same paper:

‘Will shortly Photograph every House in Beechworth. The American and Australian Photographic Company. Melbourne Office : 73, Little Collins-street, East. Sydney Office : 4, Barrack-street.’