Underworld Blog
Descend into Sydney’s seedy underworld with our blog. Discover exclusive stories, never-before-seen images, and behind-the-scenes insights
Find out more about Sydney’s crime history with our exciting new blog.
Under our care is the striking sandstone Justice & Police Museum, once one of the colony’s busiest legal complexes.
Today, the museum cares for an eclectic collection of material relating to Sydney’s criminal and policing history. This includes the remarkable New South Wales Police Forensic Photography Archive, made up of approximately 130,000 negatives in both glass-plate and cellulose film formats.
Taken between 1910 and 1964, the images in the archive document, in all their gritty and at times confronting detail, Australia’s ‘Sin City’ – its people, their misfortunes and their crimes.
Underworld: Mugshots from the Roaring Twenties was an exhibition exploring the archive through extensive research and high-quality reproductions of the fascinating police images, never intended for public consumption. Find out more about this unique collection of negatives known as the ‘Specials’ – mugshots of suspects in police custody, and particularly the extraordinary series taken between 1920 and 1930.
The exhibition and accompanying book explore suspects’ stories, photographic techniques, and new research into 1920s crime networks.
Now, descend further into Sydney’s seedy underworld with our blog. Discover exclusive stories, never-before-seen images, and behind-the-scenes insights. Start exploring today!
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Underworld
Barbara Turner Taylor: Plotter
Described by police as the cleverest magswoman and confidence trickster in New South Wales, Barbara Turner Taylor was a master in manipulation
Underworld
Patrick Roach: a well-connected bruiser
Patrick Roach was an inveterate thief and a vicious thug. Quick with his fists, he was well known to police and residents around Glebe, Darlington, Ultimo and Chippendale
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Ettie Benn: Escapologist
Ethel ‘Ettie’ Benn was an extraordinarily athletic thief who never learned from her mistakes
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The 'Apache' Thief
Join Nerida Campbell, curator of the Underworld exhibition as she continues to uncover interesting stories from Sydney’s seedy underworld
Underworld
Defiant love
Love can make people do crazy things, risking their reputations, careers and even their freedom. New research into the NSW Police Forensic Photography Archive has revealed some unexpected stories behind the images
Underworld
Obsession
Love can make people do crazy things, risking their reputations, careers and even their freedom. New research into the NSW Police Forensic Photography Archive has revealed some unexpected stories behind the images
Underworld
Love and larceny
Love can make people do crazy things, risking their reputations, careers and even their freedom. New research into the NSW Police Forensic Photography Archive has revealed some unexpected stories behind the images
Behind the scenes
Underworld
Nerida Campbell Joins Studio 10
Today Underworld curator Nerida Campbell joined Studio 10 to share her insights into the captivating exhibition mugshots
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Behind the scenes: The Underworld Book
Join Bruce Smythe Senior Project Designer, as he takes us behind the scenes of the design of our 'Underworld: mugshots from the Roaring Twenties' publication
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Behind The Scenes: Underworld Exhibition Design
Join Kieran Larkin Senior 3D Designer, as he takes us behind the scenes of the design of our Underworld: Mugshots from the Roaring Twenties exhibition
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Behind the scenes: How to read a ‘special’
Around the world, police forces followed established conventions when taking mugshots. But Sydney police in the 1920s did things differently
Razor Gangs
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Following in the footsteps of the Razor Gangs
Step into Sydney’s seedy underworld with Larry Writer, author of Razor: Tilly Devine and the razor gangs as he explores the mean streets of Kings Cross, Woolloomooloo, East Sydney and Darlinghurst as featured on his Razorhurst walking tours
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Following in the footsteps of the Razor Gangs - Part 2
Join writer Larry Writer, author of Razor: Tilly Devine and the razor gangs in his latest instalment of walking the mean 1920s streets as featured on his Razorhurst walking tours
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Following in the footsteps of the Razor Gangs: Charlotte Lane
On 22 June 1927, the original razor gangster, Norman Bruhn, was shot to death by a gunman lurking in the shadows outside Mac’s sly-grog shop in Charlotte Lane, just around the corner from Stanley Street in Darlinghurst
Glass plate negatives
Underworld
Captured on glass
It’s almost 100 years since New South Wales police used glass-plate negatives to photograph suspects in custody. These negatives are a direct link to that moment in time, and provide evidence about photographic technology and methods in the 1920s
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Channelling the police photographer
As part of a workshop with Ellie Young at Gold Street Studios in Trentham, Victoria, I had the opportunity to take my own photographs using dry glass plate negatives
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Creating glass plate negatives
Photography practitioners today are rediscovering historical, analogue photography processes
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Photography with slow emulsions
Many of the Special photographs show evidence of long exposures where sitters have moved during the exposure time, causing a blur in the final image. This is probably in part due to the slow emulsions on the dry plates used to produce these photographs
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Underworld
Bosses
Sydney’s underworld bosses were tough, resolute and violent – mess with one and you would know you had been in a fight
Underworld
Plotters
Parting fools from their money was the plotter’s goal, and took careful planning and superior powers of persuasion
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Petty crims
Petty criminals made up the largest group of felons and committed a diverse array of crimes, ranging from stealing to using offensive language
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Fallen soldiers
After the universal upheaval of World War I, many soldiers found it difficult to take up their former occupations and adjust to civilian life
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Flappers
The flapper was an alluring vision of sophistication and freedom for young women globally
Underworld
Gangs
The lure of easy money from the illicit alcohol, drug and gambling trades encouraged the formation of new crime gangs
Related
Past exhibition
Underworld: Mugshots from the Roaring Twenties
Welcome to the dark side of the Roaring Twenties. Descend into a seedy underworld where the only rules were never squeal to the police and always, always shoot first
Buy the book
'Underworld' features intriguing mugshots of police suspects from 1920s Sydney, documenting the denizens of the criminal underworld, from stone-cold gangsters to wayward youths, and providing a remarkable rogues' gallery of thugs and thieves, prostitutes and pickpockets, white-collar opportunists and blue-collar gunmen
How the Specials inspired singer Russell Morris
Inspired by the enigmatic police photograph of Sydney swindler Thomas “Shark Jaws” Archer (alias Thomas Sweeney, Thomas Everet), celebrated Australian musician Russell Morris wrote his hit blues and roots song Sharkmouth