Lieut Thomas Skottowe (73rd Regiment) compiles an illustrated manuscript with convict artist Richard Browne

(Commandant of the Newcastle penal settlement, Lieut Thomas Skottowe (73rd Regiment) compiles an illustrated manuscript with convict artist Richard Browne. This is the first comprehensive effort in the colony. It records Aboriginal names in Browne’s handwriting and language. Browne later concentrates almost exclusively on portraits of Aboriginal people. Around 1820, Browne paints full-length and head-and-shoulder portraits, including those of Awabakal chief Burigon (or Burgon and “Long Jack”), Magill (or “John McGill” and later Biraban), and tribal “chiefs” Cobbawn Wogi and Coola-benn, and Coola-benn’s wife Wambla. (Ellis, Treasures of Newcastle from the Macquarie Era, 2013, p2-3)