Stills from the sequence.
| Sequence 1 | Sequence 2 |
 |  |
 |  |
| Sequence 3 | Sequence 4 |
Some of the footage is available on Wikimedia
Note from David Zeitlyn as 2021 Editor: this pages collates several pages accompanying the original database that discuss Haddon's original films. Some links have been updated but as much as possible I have not touched the original text. Readers are also alerted to Michael Eaton's 2010 film about Haddon 'The Masks of Mer'
It is estimated that Haddon took some 2,250 feet of film to the Torres Strait Islands, to be shot on a 35mm Newman and Guardia camera camera. From this stock some 4.5 minutes of developed footage now remain (information from Long and Laughren 1993 (extract below))
The extant footage consists of four sequences (the second sequence consists of two near-identical takes):
| Sequence 1 | Sequence 2 |
| |
| |
| Sequence 3 | Sequence 4 |
Some of the footage is available on Wikimedia
The images currently being used on these pages were frame-grabbed from a VHS video tape copy of the footage. We hope in due course to replace them with higher quality frame stills taken directly from a film copy of the footage.
Note: the following text is an extract from an article that first appeared in Cinema Papers No.96, 1993, pp. 32-37; 59-61. It describes A.C. Haddon's film work in the Torres Strait in the context of the development of cinema in Queensland and Australia more generally. The following extract (pp. 33-36) is reproduced with kind permission of the authors.
Two years after graduating from Cambridge University in 1878, Haddon was appointed Professor of Zoology at the Royal College of Sciences, and Assistant Naturalist to the Science and Art Museum in Dublin. In this capacity, Haddon spent eight months on an expedition investigating the marine zoology of Torres Strait during 1888 and 1889. There, he became fascinated by the rapidly disappearing customs and ceremonies of the Islanders, spending most of his spare time noting details for subsequent publication. Several minor papers were subsequently published, but the research was inadequate to assemble a general ethnographic work on the region.[14]
Haddon therefore assembled a team of scientists, all subsequent leaders in their specialities, to go to Torres Strait in 1898 and make a thorough study of it. They were comprehensively equipped with the very latest scientific recording instruments. Sidney Ray, an authority on the languages of Oceania, the musicologist Dr. C.S. Myers and the naturalist Dr. C.G. Seligman used two wax-cylinder phonographs to make about one hundred records of Islander speech and song.[15] These survive in the British Institute of Recorded Sound. Their photographic kit included equipment for taking stills, movies and even experimental colour photographs by the Ives and Joly process. These would have been the earliest colour photographs taken in Australia.[16] The photography was done by Haddon and by a 21 year old student with previous experience in Algeria and Egypt, Anthony Wilkin, who died of dysentery in Cairo only three years later.[17] The psychologists and medical experts Dr. W.H.R. Rivers and Dr.W. McDougall completed the party.
They reached Thursday Island on 22 April 1898 and spent almost seven months in the Torres Strait and New Guinea. Four months were spent in the Murray Islands, whose inaccessibility and relatively undisturbed culture made them particularly suitable for study. Two visits were made there, the first during May 1898, the latter commencing on 20 July and concluding on the 8 September.[18]
In March 1898, Haddon purchased a 35 mm Newman and Guardia movie outfit in London, including 30 rolls of raw film 75 feet long, intending to reproduce Islander dances, ceremonies and customs.[19] The dispatch of the film was apparently delayed by being inadvertently sent to Haddon's friend, Mr. C. Hose, in Sarawak.[20] As a result, filming did not begin until the last week of their second stay on Murray Island, after 1 September 1898. Another problem was encountered with the Newman and Guardia movie camera, which sustained damage in transit, causing the films to jam in the tropical climate. Only a few films were taken successfully.
According to Haddon's diary,[21] the films were made by Haddon himself, possibly assisted by Anthony Wilkin:
Haddon's fears about his films were ill founded. On return to London, he had the few rolls shot on Murray Island processed by Newman and Guardia. Reporting on these on 28 June 1899, J.Guardia told him:
On 23 October 1900, hearing of Spencer and Gillen's forthcoming expedition to Central Australia, Haddon wrote to Spencer:
Examination of the Warwick Trading Company film catalogue for August 1901 reveals that Haddon may have allowed one of his films to be "copied by the trade" in the manner he suggested:
The film is not known to survive and the inclusion of the "pan" movement described is puzzling, as none of Haddon's known films show that he could "pan" to follow dancers' movements. However, Spencer was quick to follow Haddon's advice. On 1 December 1900, Spencer wrote to Haddon:
Spencer's work with the Warwick Bioscope in Central Australia during 1901 is well known.[27] Many popular histories credit him as being the pioneer of these techniques, ignoring the Torres Strait precedent. Haddon reaped more tangible rewards. In 1900, he was appointed University Lecturer in Ethnology at Cambridge University, and in 1901 was elected to a fellowship at Christ's College.[28]
Haddon's films were stored at Cambridge until 1967, when the British Film Institute copied them.[29] Prints are now held by the National Film & Sound Archive and AIATSIS in Canberra, and by Ian Dunlop at Film Australia in Lindfield. They are the oldest surviving Queensland films, and the oldest films of Torres Strait Islanders. As a result of the bêche de mer men's visit to Murray Island on 6 September 1898, they are also the oldest films of Australian Aborigines.
[Notes [1] - [12] relate to the earlier part of the text, not reproduced here]
[13] Ian Dunlop, "Ethnographic Film-Making in Australia - The First Seventy Years", in Aboriginal History 1979, 3:2. [back to text]
[14] Torres Straits Pilot, 19 March 1898, pp.2-3. A.C. Haddon Australian and Pacific Papers Indiex, National Library of Australia, 1991, p.i. [back to text]
[15] Alan Ward, "The Frazer Collection of Wax Cylinders: An Introduction", in Recorded Sound 85, Journal of the British Library National Sound Archive, January 1984, p.1. See also A.C. Haddon Papers, Cambridge University Library, envelope 1049. The two phonographs were an Edison "Home" and a Columbia "Bijou". [back to text]
[16] Earliest Australian colour photos were previously assumed to have been taken by Mark Blow in 1899. Refer Alan Davies, The Mechanical Eye in Australia, Oxford University Press, Melbourne, 1985, p.104. [back to text]
[17] A.C. Haddon, Headhunters: Black, White and Brown, Methuen, London, 1901. [back to text]
[18] Ibid. [back to text]
[19] A.C. Haddon Papers, Cambridge University Library, envelope 1049. Microfilm copy held at National Library of Australia, Canberra. [back to text]
[20] Information from Frances Calvert, Berlin [back to text]
[21] A.C. Haddon Papers, envelope 1055: Diary 10 March 1898-25 March 1899. [back to text]
[22] A.C. Haddon Papers, envelope 1030: Haddon's 1898 Journal [back to text]
[23] A.C. Haddon Papers, envelope 1049: J. Guardia to A.C. Haddon, 28 June 1899. [back to text]
[24] Reports of the Cambridge Anthropological Expedition to Torres Straits, Vol. 6, pp. 306-307. [back to text]
[25] W.B. Spencer Papers, Pitt Rivers Museum, Oxford University: Haddon to Spencer, 23 October 1900. Copy held by Ian Dunlop. [back to text]
[26] A.C. Haddon Papers, Box 1 envelope 3: Spencer to Haddon, 1 December 1900. [back to text]
[27] Ross Lansell and Peter Beilby, The Documentary Film in Australia, Cinema Papers, in association with Film Victoria, Melbourne, 1982, p.23. [back to text]
[28] A.C. Haddon Australian and Pacific Papers Index, National Library, Canberra, 1991, p.i. [back to text]
[29] British Film Institute catalogue card, "Torres Strait" (film), Haddon. 272 feet, 35 mm, from Cambridge Ethnographical Society, 1967. [back to text]
from 1996 not updated Works by A. C. Haddon:
Works about A. C. Haddon:
Works about the Torres Strait:
Films about the Torres Strait:
This page last updated by Marcus Banks [29.3.96]
This page last updated by David Zeitlyn [18 Sept 2021]Haddon's Films
Haddon's journal covering the week of 1-8 September 1898, written while the expedition was packing for its departure from Murray Island, indicates that filming had only been a partial success:
Although limited in both scope and duration, the surviving 4.5 minutes of Haddon's films continue to surprise modern audiences with their high technical standard. The material surviving matches the descriptions in Haddon's diary and journal, and there seems to be little missing from the print. Strangely, no screenings of the films by Haddon have been traced. The six volumes of Reports of the Cambridge Anthropological Expedition to Torres Straits, published between 1901 and 1935, contain virtually no mention of the films, other than a few frame enlargements (plate 29) in volume six. These show "the movements of the zogo le" (cult priests) from the Bomai-Malu ceremony, stated to have been shot at Kiam in the Eastern Torres Strait.[24]
Influence on Baldwin Spencer
Haddon's Torres Strait Expedition Filmography
Three men in labalabas perform a processional dance on a beach. Camera jam occurs mid-shot and the dance re-commences. Length 70 seconds.
Unidentified dance, same camera position as (2), but with camera panned slightly to the right. Three men dancing in procession on a beach. Length 21 seconds.
Three men - Pasi, Sergeant and Mana - sit cross-legged on the ground, twirling a stick between their palms bearing upon a wood block (drill method). Length 30 seconds
Four visiting Australian Aborigines wearing labalabas clap, then dance, then clap again. A fifth man beats rhythm by hitting a long pole with a branch. Film in three sections with cuts separating them. Same locale as items (2) and (3). Length 70 seconds.
Notes
Further reading and films relating to the Torres Strait