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'The parting - "Buy us too"', 1863

This is a colour lithographic card showing a shackled slave being taken away by his new owner as his wife and child beg to be bought as well so the family would not be separated. The owner gestures them away with his whip. The card was the fourth in a collectable series of 12 album cards entitled 'The slave in 1863. A thrilling ...

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Thornhill plantation house, 2010

This is the two-storey Thornhill plantation house in Greene County, Alabama, showing the southern facade with its two-story portico of six Ionic columns across the front, and the eastern-side elevation. The photograph was taken by Carol Highsmith.

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Sketch of a slave cabin in Virginia, 1864

This is a black-and-white sketch showing a slave cabin with a small girl standing in front. The handwritten caption reads 'Slave Cabin near the Long Bridge, Chicahominy River, Va [Virginia], June 13th 1864'. The artist was Edwin Forbes and elsewhere on the drawing he noted, 'Sketched while on the march from Long Bridge ...

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'The abolition of the slave trade', 1792

This is a hand-coloured cartoon print showing an African girl being hoisted by the ankle for a flogging on board the British slaving vessel Recovery. The vessel's captain John Kimber is seen on the left, whip in hand. The cartoon was drawn by Isaac Cruikshank and published by S W Fores in London on 10 April 1792. The alternative ...

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'Effects of the Fugitive-Slave-Law', 1850

This is a black-and-white print showing four African Americans attacked in an ambush by six armed white men. One of the white men is firing as two others reload their guns, and two of the African Americans have been hit. The print is a denunciation of the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850, its effect reinforced by two quotations ...

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'Slavery as it exists in America. Slavery as it exists in England', 1850

This is a black-and-white print showing two contrasting scenes of 'slavery' produced by J Haven of Boston, USA. The top scene shows African American slaves in the US southern states dancing and playing the banjo after their day's work is over. The bottom scene shows four episodes of people lamenting the 'slavery' of work ...

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Slaves exposed for sale

This is a black-and-white engraving showing a group of near-naked African men, women and children next to a smaller group of European men who appear to be discussing them, perhaps negotiating their sale. One African man is depicted with a chain around his neck, which bears a name or number on a metal plate. The scene appears ...

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'Am I not a man and a brother?', 1837

This is a black-and-white illustration of a kneeling male slave in chains. It appeared on a broadside (a poster, often with a poem or news and sometimes with woodcut illustrations) published in New York. The broadside also featured John Greenleaf Whittier's anti-slavery poem, 'Our countrymen in chains' and two quotations, ...

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African American teacher and pupils at a segregated rural school in Oklahoma, 1940

This is a black-and-white photograph showing an African American female teacher with two students in a school in Creek County in the US state of Oklahoma. The photograph was taken by Russell Lee in February 1940. Part of the caption he wrote for the image reads, 'This year, despite the fact the white school received free ...

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Landmarks: people and places across Australia

This resource features the Landmarks gallery, which traces a broad history of Australia since British colonisation in the late 18th century. The exhibition explores ten big themes in the country's past through the stories of Australian places and the people who have lived there. It examines how people have engaged with ...

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Police arresting an African American during the Sojourner Truth housing riot, 1942

This is a black-and-white photograph showing an African American being arrested by two policemen in Detroit, Michigan. One mounted policeman looks on and another stands guard. The photograph was taken in February 1942, almost certainly on 28 February, by Arthur Siegel. Part of the photograph's caption reads: 'Riot at the ...

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'Relics of convict discipline', c1911-15

This is a sepia-toned black-and-white photograph (3.7 cm x 8.8 cm) showing items used to discipline or control convicts at Port Arthur. The collection, most of which is hanging on a wood-panelled wall, includes leg-irons, a ball and chain, handcuffs, whips (one of them a cat-o'-nine-tails), rifles and a sword. Text at the ...

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'Meeting of Major Mitchell and Edward Henty, Portland Bay, 1836'

This is a photo-engraving, approximately 52.5 cm x 69.0 cm in size, depicting two men in front of a farm greeting a party of visitors. It shows Edward Henty shaking the hand of Major Thomas Mitchell, who is on horseback. They are watched by a man standing on the left-hand side and by four members of Mitchell's party on ...

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'John Batman's famous treaty with the blacks', c1914

This is a black-and-white engraving, measuring 40.4 cm x 57 cm, made by George Rossi Ashton (1851-1942) in about 1914. It depicts John Batman (1801-39) and an elderly Indigenous Australian man leaning over what is probably a treaty document on the decayed trunk of a large fallen tree. They are surrounded by 16 men, many ...

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Freed unionist shearers following the 1891 Shearers' Strike, 1893

This is a black-and-white poster showing 13 shearers who had been jailed in 1891 during the central Queensland Shearers' Strike. Across the top of the poster, in large letters, is printed 'FREEDOM WITHOUT DISHONOUR' and 'UNIONIST PRISONERS'. The poster goes on to identify each man individually as having been sentenced at ...

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Convict jacket

This is a woollen convict jacket from Tasmania. The inside of the jacket is stamped with the mark 'WD', indicating that it was issued by the War Department, and it has an arrow mark, signifying British Government property. These marks date the jacket to after 1855.

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Sheep run and wool dray, c1855

This is an oil painting on canvas, measuring 12.2 cm x 19.0 cm, painted in about 1855. It is made in the form of a Christmas card, inscribed with 'The COMPLIMENTS OF THE SEASON'. The painting has two 'pictures within a picture', like wall hangings, surrounded by the leaves and bright red flowers of Sturt's desert pea. One ...

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Possum trappers

This is a photograph of two New Zealand possum trappers. It was taken in 1929 in Taranaki, North Island, and shows the trappers with the dried skins of the Australian brush-tailed possum ('Trichosurus vulpecula').

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Gold nugget

This is a gold nugget (approximately 3.4 cm x 2.2 cm), which was probably found in about 1865 on a goldfield in Otago (in the southern South Island of New Zealand).

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Penny-farthing bicycle, c1888

This is a penny-farthing, or high-wheel bicycle, built in Melbourne by H Bassett and Co in the late 1880s. Called 'The Victory', it has a 142-cm diameter front wheel and a smaller rear wheel, both with solid rubber tyres. The pedals are fixed directly to the axle of the front wheel. The leather seat sits on a 'cradle spring' ...