Design and Art Australia Online

amateur photographer and doctor of medicine, came to South Australia from Springfield, County Clare, Ireland, with his wife and family and settled at Kapunda. Dr and Mrs Blood remained there for the rest of their lives apart from a two- to three-year-long visit to New South Wales in the 1860s to stay with their eldest son, William, when Dr Blood appears to have taken up photography. As well as being the first official doctor at the Kapunda copper-mines and first resident general practitioner in the district, Blood became renowned as an enthusiastic amateur photographer: 'Most of his friends had to submit themselves to the ordeal.’ In the 1860s he probably organised his photographic supplies through Stephen Nixon or Nixon brothers . During the 1870s he used a large plate camera especially made for him by the then resident Kapunda professional photographer, James Uren.

Blood was mayor of Kapunda when the Duke of Edinburgh visited the town and the mines in 1867, but the official photographic record of this momentous occasion was taken by Stephen Nixon. A carte-de-visite from the firm of Blood & Nixon must date from the 1880s, when the partners would have been Dr Blood’s youngest son, Johnny (John Henry Smyth Blood) – known to have had a short fling as a professional photographer before settling into a long career in the Post Office – and Stephen Nixon’s son, Charles.

Dr Blood was a long-serving officer in the local Volunteer Force. As well, he was famous throughout the district as a prodigious snuff-taker. He and his wife had nine children. Their six girls were educated by an Irish governess, Miss Howe, who lived with the family and became Mrs Blood’s companion after Dr Blood died, on or about 30 March 1883.

Writers:

Staff Writer

Date written:

1992

Last updated:

2011