• Title
  The Gold Commissioner's station at Timbarra, New South Wales, ca. 1870 / Mrs Louisa Green-Emmott
• Creator
  Louisa Green-Emmott
• Call number
  ML 1262
  Status: On display – Paintings from the Collection, Room 2, North Wall, no. 135
  
• Level of description
  fonds
• Date
  
  ca. 1870
• Type of material
  Graphic Materials, Paintings
• Reference code
  931617
• Physical Description
  1 painting - oil on canvas - visible image 75.2 x 110.6 cm., in frame 93.5 x 129 cm.
  
• ADMINISTRATIVE/ BIOGRAPHICAL HISTORY
  
  Louisa Green-Emmott, amateur painter, was also known as Louisa Mary Green or Louisa Mary Sheridan. Louisa Sheridan McPherson married George Green in 1840. They lived at Emmott Hall, Colne, Lancashire, the Green ancestral home. In 1851 the family added Emmott to their surname.
  
  The family left England for Australia, supposedly because of debts, and arrived on 21 March 1853. Their three surviving children travelled with them: Marion Caroline, aged 12 years (m. 1860), Charles Richard (1847-1860) and Gertrude aged 4 years. Two other children, Georgina (d. 1848) and Susanna Emmeline (d. 1847) had died before the family left England. Charles died in Australia and is buried at Tenterfield.
  
  In May 1859 George Green-Emmott was appointed sub-Gold Commissioner of the Timbarra gold fields, also `to be a magistrate of the territory and its dependencies, and officer responsible for determining the extent and position of claims and marking their extent.' (SMH, 4 June 1859)
  
  Two sons, Sydney Robert (1855-1856) and Walter Egerton John (1865-1939), were born at Timbarra.
  
  Emmott Hall was rented while the family was in Australia and they took up residence there again on their return to England around 1871.
  
  References:
  Library correspondence file.
  Hordern House March 2011 catalogue, no. 13.
  Burke, B., Genealogical and heraldic history of the landed gentry of Great Britain and Ireland (London, 1879).
  Information supplied by descendant who is the great-granddaughter of Louisa Green-Emmott and granddaughter of Walter Green Emmott, February 2019 (source: Library correspondence file).
  Sydney Morning Herald, 4 June 1859.
  "Louisa Mary Green-Emmott b. UK", Dictionary of Australian Artists Online (accessed 11/8/2011).
• Collection history
  Provenance by descent in the family of the artist; first offered for sale in 1990 when it is last recorded as trading, via Sotheby’s Australia; offered again by Christie’s in 1993, unsold. The Museum of Australia has exhibited the painting, on loan from Hordern House.
• Scope and Content
  Depicts the rudimentary official compound and settlement at the Timbarra goldfield. The Commissioner's house is probably the building in the centre foreground with gardens around. The troopers with the packhorse in the view may be the gold escort leaving the settlement. In 1866 the subject of the gold escort between Tenterfield and the Clarence, and Tenterfield and Armidale was raised in the Legislative Assembly. A controversial issue of police protection and responsibility for gold protection is hinted at in the painting.
• Copying Conditions
  Out of copyright: Artist died before 1955
  Please acknowledge:: Mitchell Library, State Library of New South Wales
• Subject
  Gold mines and mining--New South Wales.
  
• Topic
  settlements
  goldmining
  colonial art
  official buildings
  
• Place
  Timbarra (N.S.W.)
  
• Exhibited in
  
  Paintings from the Collection - State Library of New South Wales (2018)
• Open Rosetta viewer
  IE9469923

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