surveying

See comments and other related photos -

Trying to read the time on the GPO clock ... ... ??

The clock on North Sydney post office, more likely.

Similar view a few years later -

This photograph is one of a series that was researched as part of the ‘Archives, Histories, Landscapes: Surveying Sierra Leone’s Cultural Memoryscape’ project funded by the British Academy and led by Paul Basu at University College London. It was taken during the Anglo-French Boundary Commission of 1891-92, which sought to determine the boundary between French Guinea and what would become the British Protectorate of Sierra Leone. The British contingent was led by Captain A. H. Kenney of the Royal Engineers. Other members of the British expedition included Surgeon Major J. J. Lamprey, the botanist G. F. Scott-Elliot, three non-commissioned officers of the Royal Engineers (Sergeant Gibson, 2nd Corporal McGregor and Lance-Corporal Lines), and a Sierra Leonean interpreter named Mahmadu Wakka. They were escorted by a troop of the Frontier Police under the command of Captain Campbell. During the expedition Scott-Elliot collected around 2,000 botanical specimens for Kew Herbarium and prepared a parliamentary report on his findings. Due to disagreements between the French and British parties, the Boundary Commission itself was not successful and was abandoned by the French Commissioners. A second, more successful Anglo-French Boundary Commission was organised in 1895-96, which demarcated much of the existing boundary between Guinea and Sierra Leone. At the time of the 1891-92 expedition, the region was being destabilised not only by the expansion of British and French colonial interests, but also by the aggressive tactics of Samory Touré’s Sofa army as it fought to maintain the territory of the Wassoulou Empire. Kenney reported that they saw ‘abundant evidence of the devastation wrought by the Sofas when they over-ran the country in 1885’, and as they proceeded further inland there were also signs of more recent conflict. Despite the failure of the Commission, the British contingent continued inland as far as Farana on the banks of the River Niger, and met with the Sofa general Kemo Bilalé at Heremakono before returning to Freetown. The photographs in this album document the progress of the expedition. Although the locations were not written alongside the photographs, they can be identified with varying degrees of accuracy by comparing the dates with the itinerary described in the reports prepared by Kenney and Scott-Elliot. On 28 February 1892 the Commission was in the vicinity of Kassa across the border in present day Guinea. The photograph shows two members of the Commission posing with their theodolite.

He was born in Cork, County Cork, Ireland, the son of James Macdonald, an artist, art critic and one of the claimants of the Annandale Peerage. Upon the death of the last legitimate heir of the MacDonald's of Castleton, Isle of Skye, Scotland, James Macdonald inherited that title, as the nearest surviving legitimate male kin. John was educated at Cork school of medicine and King's College, London, where he was awarded M.R.C.S.Eng in 1849. He later was awarded M.D. from the University of St. Andrews. Macdonald joined the Royal Navy as an assistant surgeon and initially served at the Royal Hospital, Plymouth. In 1852 he was appointed to the survey ship HMS Herald. As a result of his studies, principally with the microscope, on the seabed deposits brought up by the dredger he was awarded in 1862 the Makdougall-Brisbane prize by the Royal Society of Edinburgh and elected a member of the Royal Society in 1859 (his membership was proposed by Joseph Toynbee, Edwin Lankester, Francis Sibson, Richard Owen and Richard Partridge among others). In 1864, by now promoted to surgeon, he was appointed to the Royal Hospital Haslar in Gosport, Hampshire and in June 1870 was made staff surgeon to HMS Lord Warden, flagship in the Mediterranean. In March 1872 he was appointed to the flagship at Portsmouth for service as professor of naval hygiene at the Army Medical School at Netley, a post he continued to hold after his promotion to Deputy Inspector-General of Hospitals and Fleets in February 1875. In July 1880 he was promoted Inspector-General, and put in charge of the Royal Naval Hospital at Plymouth from 1883 to 1886. He retired in 1886. Following the succession of King Edward VII, he was among several retired navy officers appointed Knight Commander of the Order of the Bath in the 1902 Coronation Honours list published on 26 June 1902, the investiture was on board the royal yacht Victoria and Albert outside Cowes on 15 August 1902, the day before the fleet review held there to mark the coronation. In later life he researched in the fields of zoology and natural history. He died in Southall, Middlesex in 1908. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Denis_Macdonald