Lochaber Archive Series: Francis Gray Smart Photographs

"attachment_795856" "" "300"] High Life Highland.

 

Trainee archivist Rory Green continues his journey through the fascinating collections at the Lochaber Archive Centre.

 

"attachment_907081" "" "211"] Jessie Maclean, crofter at Glenelg.

 

The Bob Charnley Collection, held at the Lochaber Archive Centre, contains copies of

 

photographs taken by Francis Gray Smart in 1889.

 

The photographs, showing people and scenes at Glenelg and Aultbea, are a truly remarkable record of Highland life in the late 19th century.

 

The story behind the collection is more remarkable still.

 

The original copies of these photographs were discovered by absolute chance as Bob Charnley, a collector of photographs, postcards, books, and ephemera from the Scottish

 

Highlands, perused a second-hand bookshop in Cheshire.

 

Charnley, from Lancashire, came upon 283 photographs of unknown people taken by an unknown traveller, which appeared to be a private record of a holiday taken during the summer months of 1889.

 

Charnley felt the photographer had a natural eye for a good picture and had gone off the beaten track in search of subjects.

 

In doing so, he had left behind a unique record of work, play and interests of the

 

Highlanders of the 19th century, their villages and homes.

 

The photographs were contained within a leather-bound album with Scotch Tour 1889 engraved in gold lettering, but nowhere was the photographer's name written.

 

Charnley, after much investigation and his own tour of the Scottish Highlands to speak with locals about events that took place 100 years previous, finally identified the photographer as Dr Francis Gray Smart.

 

Smart had resided in Tunbridge Wells in Kent and was the first president of the Tunbridge Wells Photographic Association.

 

In 1889, aged 45, Smart, accompanied by his wife, embarked on a tour of Scotland by carriage, train, and steamer.

 

It is on this tour that he captured the photographs which were later discovered by

 

Charnley and published for the first time in 1991, in Charnley’s book The Summer of ’89.

 

Of the 283 photographs found by Charnley, we have copies of only a small handful.

 

However, they are a joy to behold and among them is the image that ‘started it all’ for

 

Charnley, eventually being used on the front cover of his book.

 

The photograph is of a ‘hauntingly-beautiful’ traveller woman ‘her wares looped over her arm; a baby slung on her back’.

 

In our collections, this photograph is listed as ‘Tinker Woman in Glenelg: Isabella Macdonald (24) holding bundle of pots and her infant son Solomon on her back, with her sister Henrietta Stewart (9) beside her.’

 

‘Tinker’ is the name, which for some has passed into the pejorative, given to itinerant tinsmiths - members of the Traveller community who made their money mending pots, pans, or utensils.

 

"attachment_907084" "" "300"] Camp of tinker family at Galtair, Glenelg.

 

Another photograph shows the camp of a tinker family at Galtair, Glenelg.

 

Women hard at work is certainly a theme running through Dr Smart’s photographs. A favourite of mine is of a crofter, Jessie Maclean, who stands with a basket on her back, also at Glenelg.

 

These copies can be viewed in the searchroom at the Lochaber Archive Centre, as can The Summer of ’89, which we have on our bookshelf.

 

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email: lochaber.archives@highlifehighland.com