Hong Kong - Canton steamboat captains

Captain Lossius and his wife on the deck of SS Kinshan.

I found these three photos in a flea market in England. Having spent my childhood in Hong Kong I was quite thrilled to come across them. I've managed to find out a great deal about these people thanks to various on-line databases and helpful individuals.....

Norwegian-born Jacob (a.k.a. Iacob) Johan Lossius (1853 -1942) and his wife Agnes Mary Potter Lossius (d. 1938). They were married in Liverpool in 1877. Both are buried in Hong Kong cemetery, Happy Valley. The SS Kinshan was a steamer which ran between Hong Kong and Canton. She was captured by the Japanese in WW2 and became the "Hachian Maru". She was sunk by USS Thresher, Dec. 30 1942.

(Below) Captain AW Dixon exercising with Indian clubs on the deck of the SS Sainam.

Article from the 'The Adelaide Advertiser'. 17th July 1906: A number of Chinese pirate junks last week attacked the paddle steamer Sainam, 588 tons, Captain A.W. Dixon, belonging to the Hong Kong, Canton and Macau steamboat company, near Etuchow. They overpowered the officers and crew of the vessel, and murdered the Rev. Dr. MacDonald, who was a passenger. Captain Dixon and the Chief Engineer were seriously wounded. The shallow-draught river gunboat, Moorhen, 180 tons, attached to the China squadron, has been dispatched to the scene of the outrage.

Dixon survived and is recorded as having died in Shanghai in 1928.

Hastings. 1907.

After scanning, enlarging and correcting, these great girls appeared out of a very faded postcard. They look somehow so modern. One of them had written on the reverse "Here we are again, having a ripping time. Eva." Which one were you, Eva?

Kansas City, USA. 1909.

Another fragment turned up of the fascinating 1909 USA set I found ages ages ago. Thanks to local history enthusiasts in Kansas City I was able to pin down the street today. It is North Indiana Avenue. The house on the left still exists but the one one the right was demolished. Our intrepid anonymous British photographer was most interested in the sort of 'house moving' that went on in America. On the back of this he wrote "two storey houses that have been moved over 300 yards in Kansas City, Missouri. Each house was lifted bodily onto rollers and then over a road and put onto foundations." 

 
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Aberdeen, Scotland. Royal visit. 1906.

Decorated with flags probably taken during the king's visit on 27th September 1906. Compare it with this photo of the same corner taken on that day, looking down in the opposite direction from one of the buildings in my photo.



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Royal Navy officers in China. 1900s or 1910s

Quite a mystery, this one! Written on the back: "Paying a special call on the Hsien of Luchou". Also the name "Lieutenant Shepherd". Men dressed in Qing dynasty style. The device in the middle appears to be an Edison wax cylinder player / recorder. 'Hsien' means an administrative district or seat of government of such a district. 

Difficult to figure out the location because of variable spellings when Latinising Chinese. Probably Luzhou, upriver from Chongqing (Chungking) in Sichuan province. Chongqing was the first inland port to be opened to foreigners in 1891. Could these officers be off a river gunboat? 

They appear to be in the central inner-hall of a traditional Chinese house, in front of the folding screen of the house shrine. 

Elderly couple with a masonic door knocker.

A grand old couple on their doorstep. The Masonic door knocker caught my attention. I found this almost identical example on Flickr.

German family. 1900s.

Many of the German photos I've found come from the same flea market in Brighton, apparently part of the same family collection. This is one of the oldest, and probably depicts members of that family. They look well-to-do; parents, a grandmother, younger children and one older son in army uniform.

"Went away"

A beautifully composed mother and child I found in Surrey. I'm not sure what to make of the inscription on the back. It says "Date went away Dec 16th 1901"

Does it mean that this photo was taken on the day they departed on a journey, or is it a euphemistic reference to a date of death?

Wedding fragment. 1900s

The bridge and groom are beheaded. The woman on the right has been carefully preserved.

Nurses

I struggle to understand how they did anything practical dressed like this.

Maid with a cat and two dogs

I found this one today in Lewes. I'm surprised she managed to make them sit still long enough.

Big hats

This is the choral society from the Lancashire village of Sabden. The building has now been identified as Sabden Baptist church, though it appears oddly smaller in this modern view. A very good example of cartwheel hats.




An example of the Merry Widow.

Found Album

A £20 bargain I found in a house clearance shop in Haywards Heath, West Sussex. It contained 21 cabinet portraits and two photographs of buildings, dating from the 1870s to 1910, taken in different parts of England and Scotland, and one from San Francisco. Several individuals appear more than once. I assume it was a family album, though the content doesn't pin it down to any one locality. See them all here.

Family in their garden with their dog. 1900s

This gentleman is surely proof than people come to ressemble their pets.

Tea and cake

This photo inspired me to create the vintage tea and cake group in Flickr, which currently contains 162 photographs on this sub-theme.

I love this interior. Those might be scones, rather than cakes. 

Wedding, Dudley, West Midlands.

A well-heeled wedding group in the industrial town of Dudley. This large print contains many fine details. See below. The young woman on the left is particularly striking and melancholy.

Mickleham, Surrey.

Nothing much has changed here, except that the post office has closed and cars have invaded. One commenter pointed out that modern masonry paints and road surfaces have 'detextured' English villages. I think he has a point. The bloke who runs the village shop now has a copy of this picture and is convinced that the children have been pasted on by some 100 year old photo trickery.


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Boer War veteran

Unidentified but much can be deduced from his badges and medals. He was in the East Surrey regiment and served in the Boer War as mounted infantry.

"Pa with Benno & Herbert" Broadstairs, Kent. 1907.

I found these first two photos in separate flea market bins, amongst hundreds of others. It was only on the train home that I realised they depicted the same family. Reunited by blind luck! There was also another of Benno as a baby with his nurse. She is named as "Gacka" or "Gaika".

At sea around Britain, 1900s

A set of 20 small photographs mostly taken at sea at various locations around the British isles, including Belfast lough, the Clyde and off the Isle of Wight. One man appears several times, identifed only as 'Will'. Will appears on the bridge of one ship, in civilian clothes alongside the ship's officers. There are also photos of two well-dressed women in a greenhouse and one of the village of Widecombe-in-the-moor in Devon.

My interpretation of this set is that 'Will' was involved in the shipping industry in some capacity.

See a selection of the photos below and the whole set on Flickr here.