German New Guinea Photograph Album

Out of copyright., Unrestricted access

1 photograph album (27 photographs): black and white ; 27 x 21.5 cm. One photograph album containing twenty-seven mounted original gelatin silver and albumen photographs. Sixteen of the images have period captions in German on the mounts. The album is 27cm x 21.5cm and features an attractive custom made full brown full calf binding with leaves bound together with string. The cover features five bronze metal ornaments: four corners and a centerpiece showing a German Imperial Eagle. Photographs include a view of the Herbertshöhe waterfront with the German Imperial flag being hoisted and the ship of the Governor of German New Guinea, Albert Hahl (1868-1945), arriving at the harbour; two scenes of launching a coastal boat at the Herbertshöhe wharf during a “high visit;” several interesting group and individual portraits of New Guineans, showing native canoes with the rowers and a “hexenmeister” (witch doctor), a group portrait of “Neuguineans Kannibalen u. Hexenmeister” (“New Guinean cannibals and a witch doctor”). There are also group portraits of German officials with families, Germans gathered at a local branch of the “Lucas Bols” drinking establishment, two photos of a German monument on the beach and four pictures from a “1905 surveying expedition” showing two hilly landscapes, the “entrance to a mine” and a portrait of two German expedition members drinking alcohol after a day’s work.