Portrait of Dr J. A. R. Menzies

Framed oleograph of the 'Hon. J. A. R. Menzies M.L.C.' Collection of Wyndham & Districts Museum

A portrait of J. A. R. Menzies that hangs in the Wyndham & Districts Museum - one of three oleographs [1] that were commissioned shortly after his death in 1888.

Menzies - the first Superintendent of Southland - was born at Mount Alexander (Dunalister) Perthshire, Scotland in 1821. His father was a doctor and he initially followed his father's profession [2] before immigrating to New Zealand in 1853 to take up farming.

In 1854 he travelled with Mantell [3] whilst looking for land for a run and selected a block of 38,000 acres on the east bank of the Mataura River, near where Wyndham was to be established, naming it Dunalister after his place of birth. [4]

'Dunalister' had no road or railway access to the nearest port at Bluff and, like many other early settlers in the south, Menzies felt that the Otago Provincial Council was neglecting them in its public works programme at the time. In 1857, as president of the Murihiku Pastoral Association, Menzies mounted a petition for the formation of a new province, to be called Murihiku, and later became the leader of the Southland separatist movement. The Southland province came into existence on 1 April 1861 and after an election in July that year, Menzies was elected superintendent at the first meeting of the Southland Provincial Council on 3 August 1861, hence his title as the first superintendent of Southland.

He was an active proponent of a railway to link the provincial capital Invercargill to its port in Bluff, and a wooden railway to Winton in the interior and intended that Invercargill become the principal supply town for the diggers on the Otago goldfields. However by 1864 the returns from the goldfields were on the decline and settlers were leaving Otago and Southland in droves. By the end of the year the Southland Provincial Council was £400,000 in debt and Menzies fell out of favour. [5]

Menzies was replaced as superintendent in 1865 but continued to serve on the Southland Provincial Council and later vigorously, but unsuccessfully, opposed the move to reunite with Otago. After the abolition of the Southland Province and re-unification with Otago in October 1870, Menzies continued to serve the Mataura district on the Otago Provincial Council until it in turn went out of existence. He promoted the interests of Southland in the Legislative Council for 30 years, from 1858 until his death at Dunalister (Wyndham) in 1888.

A political opponent once said of him, 'No mean action, no dishonest thought could have found harbour in his mental calibre.' As the creator and the first superintendent of the 'Southland province' he was an outstanding public figure. In Invercargill, where he later resided, he was either president or a member of almost every public institution, including the Caledonian Society, Bluff Harbour Board, Southland Education Board and the Invercargill Savings Bank. [6]

When one of the three oleograph portraits was presented to the Gaelic Society of Southland in 1906, Menzies, this first chief of the society, was described to be "...as true a Highlander as ever lived". [7] He was depicted with his Highland plaid and Highland bonnet, which it was said he loved to wear.

Photograph by Ross above and one of the three Morgan & Kidd [8] oleograph 1889 portraits taken from an englarged negative to the left - Collection of Wyndham & Districts Museum.

 

 

 

 

 

 

After his death, it appears that a Menzies Memorial Committee was formed to produce a memorial. An 1890 article noted that "...Mr D. Ross of Tay street has just received from London three beautifully executed oil paintings of the late Honourable Dr Menzies, M.L.C., ordered by him from Messrs Morton and Kidd [9] of that city on behalf of the Menzies Memorial Committee. They represented the deceased gentleman as he appeared in feature and dress some years ago, having being enlarged from a photo taken by Mr Ross, the negative of which has been happily preserved ... The pictures are in handsome massive frames gilded with the genuine precious metal and not with the technique known as "Dutch". A meeting of the Memorial Committee will be held at an early date to decide as to their disposition, and in the meantime they will be on view in Mr Ross' establishment and in the Council Chambers". [10]

The following day it is reported that "... A meeting of the members of this committee (Menzies Memorial Committee) was held in the Council Chambers yesterday afternoon, ... It was decided that one of the portraits of the late Dr Menzies, M.L.C., should be hung in the Council Chamber until a Town Hall is erected and another in the Athenaeum in the meantime, the disposition of the third to be held over for the present, and the Invercargill Corporation requested to take charge of the painting..." [11]

Further references, more than likely to these portraits of Menzies, appear in the newspapers from 1890 onwards. There is the framed oleograph referred to in this article that hangs at Wyndham & Districts Museum, another housed at the Southland Museum & Art Gallery in Invercargill, while the location of the third remains unknown.

Jo Massey
Roving Museum Officer
16 March 2010

 

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[1] An oleograph is a coloured lithograph impressed with a canvas grain and varnished to make it look like an oil painting. Oleographs were popular in the second half of the 19th century. They are also called chromolithograph or chromo Oleographs.

[2] Although Menzies did not practice medicine in New Zealand, apparently he always responded toa call in an emergency.

[3] Commissioner W.B.D. Mantell, who negotiated the Murihiku Block purchase (a southern part of the South Island) from the Maori, was about to set off overland from Dunedin to Bluff to make the final payment.

[4] When the government resumed the run in 1866, Menzies reduced his holding to 8,000 acres.

[5] Biographical notes based around: Hall-Jones, John. 'Menzies, James Alexander Robertson 1821 - 1888'. Dictionary of New Zealand Biography, updated 22 June 2007. URL: http://www.dnzb.govt.nz/

[6] Biographical notes based around: Hall-Jones, John. 'Menzies, James Alexander Robertson 1821 - 1888'. Dictionary of New Zealand Biography, updated 22 June 2007. URL: http://www.dnzb.govt.nz/

[7] Otago Witness 12 September 1906, p.11 'The Gaelic Society'

[8] In 1880, Messrs. W. T. Morgan & Co., (Morgan & Kidd, of Richmond, Surrey) of Greenwich, near London, commenced the manufacture on a large scale of paper coated with gelatino-bromide emulsion. In June, 1882, then known as Messrs. Morgan & Kidd they patented a method of coating or enamelling paper with an impervious and insoluble layer of gelatine containing alum; this layer prevented the film of emulsion subsequently applied from sinking into the paper, and thus rendered it available for the production of brilliant pictures from small negatives by contact printing. (Source: A history of photography written as a practical guide and an introduction to its latest developments. With an appendix by Dr. Maddox on the discovery of the gelantinobromide process" sited at http://www.archive.org/stream/historyofphotogr00harruoft/historyofphotogr00harruoft_djvu.txt)

[9] More than likely this should be Morgan & Kidd (William Thomas Morgan & Robert Leamon Kidd). IN 1884 Morgan patented photographic printing on canvas, linen & wood.

[10] Southland Times 15 November 1889 The 'Menzies Memorial'

[11] Southland Times 16 November 1889