These photographs are from a series of around 2,500 taken by the NSW Police Department photographers in the early 1900’s. They were mostly taken in the cells at the Central Police Station in Sydney and are, as curator Peter Doyle explains, of “men and women recently plucked from the street, often still animated by the dramas surrounding their apprehension”.

It has taken weeks to accurately color a handful of photographs from the archive itself. Some of the subjects are quite animated in character, almost carefree, while others reveal the gravity of their situation in expression and composure. All pictures by The Sydney Justice & Police Museum, colorized by My Colorful Past.

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1921 Sydney NSW. Barbara Turner is arrested for an act of fraud.

This is Herbert Ellis. The precise circumstances surrounding this picture are unknown, but Ellis is found in numerous police records of the 1910s, ’20s, and ’30s. He is variously listed as a housebreaker, a shop breaker, a safe breaker, a receiver, and a suspected person.

Sidney Kelly was arrested many times and often written about in newspapers during the 1920s, ’30s, and ’40s. He was charged with numerous offences including shooting and assault, and in the 1940s was a pioneer of illegal baccarat gaming in Sydney. This image appears in the Photo Supplement to the NSW Police Gazette, 26 July 1926, p. 6 captioned, “Illicit drug trader. Drives his own motor car, and dresses well. Associates with criminals and prostitutes.”

This is Alice Cooke, 1922 at the Sydney women’s reformatory. Alice, described by Sydney NSW police as “rather good looking,” she had several aliases at the time this photograph was taken at the age of 24.

1924 Sydney NSW. Vera Crichton was bound over to appear for sentence if called upon within three years.

Mr. Skukerman, glass plate negative 1924, police HQ Sydney NSW. All that was written on the glass plate mugshot is “obtains goods from warehousemen by falsely representing that he is in business.”

Bringing Vera Crichton to life

This is an 8x speed time lapse of colorization to the mugshot of Vera Crichton.

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