Frederick Henry Coldrey (1827,

Islington Islington () is a district in the north of Greater London, England, and part of the London Borough of Islington. It is a mainly residential district of Inner London, extending from Islington's High Street to Highbury Fields, encompassing the ar ...

– 19 May 1889,

Castlemaine Castlemaine may mean: * Castlemaine, Victoria, a town in Victoria, Australia ** Castlemaine Football Club, an Australian rules football club ** Castlemaine railway station * Castlemaine, County Kerry, a town in Ireland * Castlemaine Brewery, Western ...

) was an early Australian portrait photographer active c.1855 to 1889.

Biography

Born in the United Kingdom Frederick Coldrey probably had married Eleanor Louisa Lloyd (1828–1901) of

Clerkenwell Clerkenwell () is an area of central London, England. Clerkenwell was an ancient parish from the mediaeval period onwards, and now forms the south-western part of the London Borough of Islington. The well after which it was named was redisco ...

, by the time of the first record of him in Australia which was in Melbourne. There they lived in Collingwood where a son Henry Thomas Coldrey was born in 1854.

Photographer

In about 1856 Coldrey opened a collodion studio in

Ballarat Ballarat ( ) is a city in the Central Highlands (Victoria), Central Highlands of Victoria (Australia), Victoria, Australia. At the 2021 Census, Ballarat had a population of 116,201, making it the third largest city in Victoria. Estimated resid ...

with Alfred R. Fenton on the Main Road "adjoining the Bailarat Horse Bazaar." In 1857 he and Fenton (an enthusiastic amateur chemist who was likely the actual inventor) applied for a patent, effective 2 November, for a "new improvement in photography," a

collodion Collodion is a flammable, syrupy solution of nitrocellulose in ether and alcohol. There are two basic types: flexible and non-flexible. The flexible type is often used as a surgical dressing or to hold dressings in place. When painted on the skin, ...

print on black leather, known as a pannotype, which was promoted as convenient for posting; "Likenesses can be taken by this newly invented process on leather, and being once varnished, they become insensible to touch." The procedure involved making an underexposed collodion negative, giving the added advantage for portraiture of a shorter exposure time, then transferring it from the original glass support to black

oilcloth Oilcloth, also known as enameled cloth or American cloth, is close-woven cotton duck or linen cloth with a coating of boiled linseed oil to make it waterproof. Manufacture Boiled linseed oil was prepared by a long boiling of linseed oil with me ...

, leather or even wood, the result being an unbreakable photograph. Variations on the pannotype appear independently as a less fragile backing material was sought, and each practitioner used their own collodion recipe with good adhesion to its unusual substrate being the aim, so whether Fenton and Coldrey's application to leather was sufficiently unique to justify a patent is not recorded beyond their applying for one. Other photographers took up its use, several in Sydney including Lawson Insley (1858), Alfred Winter (1859), and Henry Jones (1860);

Frederick Frith Frederick Frith (1819-1871) was an English painter and photographer. He began his career in England but later moved to Australia where he lived in Hobart and Melbourne. Early career and partnership Frederick Frith was born in the United Ki ...

in Melbourne (1861), G. M. Challinor in Hobart (1861), and Thomas Ham, Brisbane (1862). Few pannotypes remain, which historians Davies and Stanbury surmise is due to their having been posted overseas, surviving examples being of a quarter-plate size. The carte-de-visite replaced the pannotype within two years. In Ballarat Coldrey was active in petitioning, with others, in support of nominations for the Municipal Council, and in calling for removal of some serving councillors, sporadic involvement in politics at a local level that he was to continue. After the death in March 1859 of his sons 6 year-old Frederick Henry William and 5 year-old Henry Thomas, compounding misfortunes, including defaulting clients, a robbery, floods, and the departure of Fenton from the partnership, meant Coldrey, unable to pay rent, was declared insolvent in August 1860. An £11 8s debt remained after the auction of his equipment and possessions. He remained in Ballarat until c.1862, then worked with Bendigo-based John W. Burrows as an itinerant photographer across the state from Avoca to

Jerilderie Jerilderie is a small, rural town in the southern Riverina region of New South Wales, Australia. It is part of the Murrumbidgee Local Government Area. At th Jerilderie had a population of 922 people. It can be found along the Newell Highway ...

Castlemaine

Coldrey joined Charles Wherrett and his assistant W. G. Cearns in Castlemaine as an ‘operator’ at a studio known for its ‘ spirit photographs’, until 1874 and likely departing on the death of Cearns and Wherrett's relocation to

Hobart Hobart ( ; Nuennonne/Palawa kani: ''nipaluna'') is the capital and most populous city of the Australian island state of Tasmania. Home to almost half of all Tasmanians, it is the least-populated Australian state capital city, and second-small ...

in 1871, before taking up management of Kerr's Portrait Rooms a few doors away in Barker St. which he rented from H. Winks. There he made a living from '' cartes-de-visite'' portraits, which he sold at 7s 6d per dozen copies, "ivory" type copies being 10 shillings per dozen, and portraits on glass from one shilling each. He offered life size enlargements of ''cartes de visite'' then being achieved with the solar enlarger. To his studio business he added an employment agency and secured a wine licence. He enjoyed minor celebrity for his ‘glee’ singing around town. He acted as auditor for Mount Alexandershire Co., Boatswain's Gully mine, and he took interest in municipal affairs and the Independent Order of Oddfellows benevolent society, to which he was appointed guardian in 1887.

In 1882 Coldrey was awarded a prize for a case photograph at the town's agricultural show and in 1881 had produced a framed composite of eighty-one portrait cameos of members of the Castlemaine Pioneers and Old Residents Association, which is archived in its offices in the heritage

Telegraph Office Telegraphy is the long-distance transmission of messages where the sender uses symbolic codes, known to the recipient, rather than a physical exchange of an object bearing the message. Thus flag semaphore is a method of telegraphy, whereas p ...

. He also made one for the

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branch in 1883. In the last decade of his career, portraiture was being offered more cheaply in the form of

tintype A tintype, also known as a melainotype or ferrotype, is a photograph made by creating a direct positive on a thin sheet of metal coated with a dark lacquer or enamel and used as the support for the photographic emulsion. Tintypes enjoyed their wi ...

s. At Castlemaine Market an itinerant franchisee of the American Gem company offered their tiny prints on metal. At 20mm to 25mm wide and 30mm high, like the ''carte de visite'' they were exposed in a multi-lens camera but directly on a single metal

photographic plate Photographic plates preceded photographic film as a capture medium in photography, and were still used in some communities up until the late 20th century. The light-sensitive emulsion of silver salts was coated on a glass plate, typically thinn ...

that was then cut. Special albums for the miniature portraits were also being marketed. It had become the most prolific form of photograph in 1860s America. Their local manifestation presented competition for Coldrey and he raised futile objection at a borough council meeting, but capitulated and advertised in Melbourne for one of the Gem cameras for his own studio.

Personal life

The family lived in rented accommodation in Bull and then Bowden streets Castlemaine where in 1869 the second last of their six living children, Albert George was born. Coldrey Street, on the corner of which the family lived, is a short lane that runs between the northern stretches of Bowden and Farnsworth streets, and is named for him. Coldrey's sons played cricket for Castlemaine and at least one was a member of the

Amalgamated Society of Engineers The Amalgamated Society of Engineers (ASE) was a major British trade union, representing factory workers and mechanics. History The history of the union can be traced back to the formation of the Journeymen Steam Engine, Machine Makers' and Mi ...

, and when in 1886 son Henry was admitted to Castlemaine Hospital with typhoid fever, Coldrey tended to him there despite his own injury from an earlier fall at the railway station. Coldrey died at Castlemaine Hospital on Sunday 19 May 1889, after taking ill on the Friday. Following his death, his wife Eleanor lived at 51 Farnsworth St Castlemaine with their only daughter, who was unmarried (also named Eleanor). The three are buried in lot 120 EE in Castlemaine Cemetery, Campbells Creek.

Work in collections

* National Gallery of Victoria *John Jenkins Collection *State Library of Victoria

Gallery

File:Coldrey Woman Port 2.jpg, Frederick H. Coldrey (c. early 1870s) Carte de Visite portrait of a young woman. File:Coldrey Woman Port.jpg, Frederick H. Coldrey (c. early 1870s) Carte de Visite portrait of a woman. File:Coldrey Man Port.tif, Frederick H. Coldrey (c. early 1870s) Carte de Visite portrait of a man. File:Coldrey Verso CdV.jpg, Frederick H. Coldrey (c. early 1870s) Carte de Visite portrait of a man (verso).

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Coldrey, Frederick Australian portrait photographers 1827 births 1889 deaths British emigrants to Australia 19th-century Australian photographers