Louis Jacques Daguerre invented a photographic process in France in 1839. Further technical advances, especially from 1851, reduced the exposure time needed to take a photograph and made the production of multiple prints possible. This led to a boom in photographic portraits. It was not long before others began to see how photography could help law authorities around the world improve their administration of criminal justice. A photograph of a person, even a black and white one, gave the viewer more accurate information than did a written description.

As the process improved, it influenced nineteenth century scientific studies of man and Darwinism. Darwinism, named after Charles Darwin, was the study of the way different species had evolved (and survived or became extinct) through natural selection.

Photography was used to help conduct large scale studies of people in the UK. It was thought you could record, categorize and understand the nature of people through the study of these photographs. People believed that by examining large numbers of these photographs of people they would collect scientific evidence to prove their scientific theories. There was a belief that the camera never lied. Recording the face through portrait photography became a central part of a method of assessing the impact of the great ideas of Victorian society, These ideas included the study of evolution, degeneration and phrenology.

The process of photographing criminals to record their identity was well established in Victoria by the 1870s. This practice was linked to the prevailing science of phrenology that tried to determine a person’s character by interpreting facial features, skull size and body shape.

Early photographs of prisoners differ little in style and format from those recording social activities or family life. For example, because photography was still an expensive process and people had photographs taken infrequently, usually only on a special occasion, people posed for photographs and looked serious. People rarely smiled in photographs in those times. Photography was used to capture important events, not for everyday family or community occasions. In those times people’s dental health was often poor and they did not want to be photographed to show the state of their teeth, so no smiling was a way to cover this situation up.

It was important for the proper administration of the prison system to keep an official record for each prisoner. This was started for a criminal as soon as they entered the prison. By the 1860s the now familiar full-face and profile ‘mug shots’ were more common. On the record for each prisoner was their prison number, details of their lives and a detailed description of their physical appearance. This included tattoos, warts, moles, scars, deformities, and missing limbs - anything that might help the police and prison authorities identify a criminal now and in the future. Understandably, police and prison authorities were quick to realize the advantages of having a picture of a criminal to help with their identification.

Prison photos were usually taken full face and in profile. Often the prisoners’ arms were placed resting on their chest with the fingers spread. This way the hands could be used as part of the identification process too.

We do not know who took the prison photographs.

Activities:

• Read the text about Gee Dee. What does this suggest to you about the use of photography to identify prisoners in early colonial Victoria? Remember: (1) Melbourne was only settled in 1835 and became an independent self-governing colony in 1851. (2) Daguerre invented his photographic process in 1839 in France. Why do you think Gee Dee was only photographed after the second conviction, not the first?
• Ask yourself: How useful is photography for identifying people? Record your initial ideas about this, including advantages and disadvantages. Now use a camera to take a picture of a person- full face and profile. Next write a description of that person’s face. Make sure your description contains accurate information about skin, eye and hair colour; face, mouth and nose shape; their forehead, hair style, neck and ears; and any special features or marks that make it easier to identify that person. Give your written description to another student to try and identify that person. Ask the student to use your description to draw this person’s face, full face and frontal. Compare drawings and photographs. Discus the advantages and disadvantages of both a written description and the photographs of a person. Consider too how the introduction of colour photography has made identification easier than in the times when only black and white photographs were used.
• Investigate major developments in photography since Daguerre’s invention of the photographic process. Where possible, explain how each of these developments might have been valuable to people responsible for identifying criminals.
• Investigate the Australian Archibald Portrait Prize. Why have some of the portraits been described as caricatures? In your own words explain the differences, uses, advantages and disadvantages of photographs, portraits, caricatures and cartoons of people. Why do you think some people had portraits painted of family members in the past? Why do you think portraits were not painted of everyone? What type of information might have been available to people searching for criminals before photography was invented? Would accurate portraits have helped?

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