The White Hat Guide to S.T.Gill

S. T. Gill
Painter

Samuel Thomas Gill was born in Devon (England) where his father was a Baptist minister, and arrived in Adelaide together with his family in 1839. In the days before the widespread use of the camera it was possible for a painter of moderate talent to make a scant living by painting portraits of wealthy men, their wives and families, their properties and prize animals. If these portraits managed to make the house look a little larger, the horse a little faster, the wife a little more beautiful and ignored the unfortunate skin condition of the patron then they were likely to be praised by the paying customer as particularly “realistic”. S.T.Gill was able to make some money from paintings of this nature in both England and Adelaide and demonstrated at this stage a competent but unremarkable skill as a painter.

It was not until he turned his hand to more general observations of the scenes of everyday life around him that his particular skills shone through. He was aware that the clumsy cameras of the time might be able to capture a remarkable degree of detail in their lengthy exposures but were not capable of capturing the character or atmosphere of everyday life in the same way that a skilled painter could. In 1846 he joined the Horrocks expedition to Spencer Gulf as a draftsman, but it was with the Victorian gold rushes from 1851 onwards that produced his most characteristic work.

In 1850, Gill’s hand became inflamed and unusable for painting. Thus deprived of an income by his usual means, and further exacerbated by his intemperate habits he found himself bankrupt in September 1851. The gold fields were looking promising. Gill headed off to the Victorian goldfields with several companions but we have no evidence of him ever becoming a serious “digger”. Instead he left us some of the best records of life on the goldfields through his paintings and sketches of the time. He later produced equally vivid depictions of life in Melbourne including icons such as The Block and the Mitre Tavern.

Unfortunately, Gill’s familiarity with taverns, together with the long term effects of syphilis were to render his later years’ output erratic, and when he collapsed on the steps of the post office in 1880 few Melbournians had any doubts about the cause of death.

S T Gill’s still speak to us directly about life in gold rush Victoria and in the colourful streets of Melbourne. Ask your guide on a White Hat Tour to show you some of his prints and point out the locations they depict. See also 'A ghostly encounter' in our newsletter of April 2005.

The grave of S.T.Gill is in the Melbourne General Cemetery.

Unfortunately, the information used by the Historical Society was not accurate, because our research places Gill at 62 when he died.

Visit this grave on White Hat Tours' highly entertaining and informative Tour of Melbourne Cemetery.

There are currently no books on S.T.Gill in print. However you may be lucky enough to find one of the two books below (complete with illustrations) in rare or out-of-print copies.

• Samuel Thomas Gill; artist
• S.T. Gill's Australia