Description

Extended Data

DAAO URL

https://www.daao.org.au/bio/didier-numa-joubert

Birth Place

France

Biography

amateur photographer, merchant and property developer, was born in Angoulême, France, eldest son of Auguste Alexis Joubert, naval officer, and Rose Elizabeth, née Civadier. He came to Sydney in the Cova Nelly in May 1837 as agent for the Bordeaux wine and spirit merchants Barton Fils but was soon on his way to New Zealand where he had purchased land (unseen) at the Bay of Islands. At Kororareka on 23 November 1839 he married Louise (Lise), daughter of Charles Bonnefin . His New Zealand land proved unsuitable for farming and the Jouberts returned to Sydney in December, setting up home, stores and office in Macquarie Place. By 1841 Joubert was in partnership with Jeremiah Murphy. Captain Lucas brought a daguerreotype camera to Sydney in late March 1841 and offered it for sale. Joubert must have purchased it for he, Murphy and Lucas were undoubtedly the 'gentlemen’ reported in the Australian as having produced, on 13 May, the first recorded photograph taken on Australian soil: 'At the stores of Messrs Joubert and Murphy, an interesting trial of the advantages of the Daguerreotype was made on Thursday, at which we were present, and received the politest attention at the hands of the gentlemen who conducted the experiment … an astonishingly minute and beautiful sketch was taken of Bridge-street and part of George-street, as it appeared from the Fountain in Macquarie-place’. The exposure time was said to be five minutes; hence the daguerreotype was considered suitable only for views of static objects. No further reports of local daguerreotypes are known to have appeared in the press until George Baron Goodman opened Sydney’s first commercial studio in December 1842, and it has been assumed that the camera either left with Lucas or else was unable to be used once the initial supply of plates and chemicals was exhausted. Yet press silence was hardly surprising when commercial photography was a British monopoly controlled under licence, as Newton has pointed out. Joubert clearly had connections in France so could have ensured a continuing supply of the necessary equipment, difficult for amateurs to obtain in British possessions and virtually impossible for professionals unless purchasing a licence in London (although Daguerre freely gave his invention to the rest of the world). Despite being prevented from selling his photographs, Joubert certainly produced further daguerreotypes as a private activity. His daguerreotype camera was stated to be 'complete, with all the apparatus, and a great number of plates’ when offered for sale in March 1843, together with all the Jouberts’ Macquarie Place household furnishings, the family being about to leave for Europe. After returning to Sydney about 1846, Didier resumed his partnership with Murphy, the firm now being located in Lower George Street. While overseas, presumably in France, Joubert had continued his photographic interests. Restrictions from England were by now collapsing (because of the impossibility of enforcing them) and photography had become much better known, so a viable local market directed primarily at amateurs was possible. On 30 April 1847 Joubert and Murphy were advertising for sale 'four complete Daguerreotype apparatus, with all the latest improvements, and a number of plates’ – undoubtedly fruits of Joubert’s European trip. (The adjacent column in the Sydney Morning Herald carried the litigious Goodman’s announcement that his professional daguerreotype portrait studio had just re-opened.) No further photographic activity on Joubert’s part is known and none of his daguerreotypes have been identified. Joubert would have known Mary Reibey at Macquarie Place, for in 1846 he purchased her 120-acre Figtree Farm at Hunter’s Hill where the family settled permanently. With his brother Jules , who brought his second wife and family to live on an adjacent property in 1855, Didier developed the peninsula. Reputedly importing some seventy stonemasons and other artisans from Lombardy, they built numerous stone houses on their land. Didier added a stone wing and paved verandah to Mary Reibey’s cottages, thus incorporating them into one building (now called Figtree House) and the family lived there until a grander home was completed. He alone is considered responsible for Coorabel (originally two stone cottages for lease), a house now called Annabel Lea (originally the servants’ quarters for Coorabel), Warrawillah (leased), St Malo (the second family home: demolished 1960) and The Bungalow (built 1881 for lease). Both brothers were active protagonists for the development of local amenities. Didier became the first mayor of Hunter’s Hill in 1867-69 while Jules was the first chairman of the local council. Didier and Lise’s son Numa, by then a planter in New Guinea, returned to Hunter’s Hill when Didier died in 1881 and for a time was proprietor of the Hunter’s Hill and Lane Cove River ferries, which his uncle had started and his father had continued (as one of a syndicate) when Jules was declared bankrupt in 1866. Alfred Randall 's Saintonge, where William Charles Piguenit also lived, was built on land acquired from D.N. Joubert in 1883. Writers: Staff Writer Date written: 1992 Last updated: 2011

Born

b. 1816

Summary

Colonial-era amateur photographer, merchant and property developer who reportedly produced the first recorded photograph taken on Australian soil. After immigrating to Sydney from France, Joubert lived the remainder of his life in Sydney and was the first mayor of Hunter's Hill.

Gender

Male

Died

1881

Age at death

65