America’s oldest mugshots show the naked faces of the downtrodden, criminal, and marginalized

The photos are also a record of advances in police surveillance

Elizabeth Wohlman was sentenced to the Missouri State Penitentiary after being accused of stealing jewelry from Eugene Jaccard and Co. Wohlman was later pardoned by Governor Thomas Fletcher. (Missouri History Museum Press)

It’s hard to imagine U.S. law enforcement today without its wealth of tracking and surveillance technologies. From facial recognition to the databases being populated with drivers’ license photos of non-criminal citizens, from police scanners tracking all mobile devices in a five-block radius to lampposts that are listening in, federal investigators and police departments nationwide have never had more tools to capture images, scrape data, and monitor movements of people.

But these “smart” technologies (and the laws that allow their use) have developed only relatively recently, and incrementally. It’s not always been so sophisticated. A hundred and fifty years ago, shortly after the invention of photography, some police departments began making images of convicted criminals. Shayne Davidson, a visual artist based in Ann Arbor, Michigan, has delved into a collection of photographs made by the St. Louis Police Department between 1857 and 1867. The archive, held at the Missouri History Museum, comprises the oldest extant examples of mugshots in the U.S.

Dave Marshal was a suspected “moll buzzer,” a thief who pickpockets or steals women’s purses. (Missouri History Museum Press)

(left) Fitzgerald, first name went unrecorded, a St. Louis conman. | (right) Mike Jordan, a “garroter” who grabs a victim around the neck from behind in order to disable them during a robbery. (Missouri History Museum Press)

John Ellies was accused of stealing horses in September 1866. (Missouri History Museum Press)

Rogues’ galleries, as mugshot collections were called, became widespread in the late 19th century as one of the earliest and simplest uses of images used by police to “know” and control populations. They were later replaced, in 1888, with the standardized frontal and profile mugshots developed by French police officer and biometrics researcher Alphonse Bertillon.

Though never produced as art objects, mugshots and police photos have become hot items for collectors in recent decades. The passage of time provides a romantic veneer to the harsh realities of the pictures.

“There is an immediacy to vintage mugshots and to certain police photos that you don’t see in posed or planned photos. They are capable of capturing a moment in a unique way,” says Davidson, “and it’s often a very emotional and unpleasant moment.”

After being arrested for embezzlement, Joseph Johnson was unable to post bail and was sent to jail to await his trial. (Missouri History Museum Press)

(left) Armstrong (first name unrecorded) described by police officer Charles Brownfield as a general thief. Self-described as a “rebel prisoner.” | (right) The description on the back of John Jordan’s photo describes him as a “whore house pimp” and a “bagman.” (Missouri History Museum Press)

(left) John Lockhart. | (right) Hiram Cole was caught in an affair and suspected of poisoning his wife to death with strychnine or arsenic. (Missouri History Museum Press)

Suspected steamboat thief John Regan would break into passengers’ rooms to steal wallets and other valuables. (Missouri History Museum Press)

Davidson’s fascination with these single-exposure ambrotypes began with Elizabeth Wohlman’s portrait (top) and snowballed from there. After digging through historical court records, newspapers, and city directories, Davidson has researched hundreds of antique mugshots depicting shoplifters, grifters, counterfeiters, pickpockets, a “wife murderer.”

“Part of it is a fascination with the individual stories and the moment that has been caught on film or the glass plate,” she says. “I’m interested in crime and I wonder what drives certain people to break the law.”

Of course, this rogues’ gallery is not merely a record of individuals but reflects the attitudes of America way back when.

“Certain groups, such as recent immigrants, were more likely to be arrested and photographed than others. The poor were more likely to be arrested and photographed. Mugshots give us a glimpse of people that society otherwise pretty much hated or feared,” Davidson points out. “The tendency to focus on immigrants and marginalized ethnic and religious groups is nothing new.”

Though Davidson is neither a criminologist or an expert in social sciences, her research is thorough, eye-opening, and a gift to us all. She, and we, need images to understand and appreciate history, she says. Now, we can view over 200 of such ambrotype portraits on a backlit screen alongside Davidson’s research in her new e-book Captured and Exposed: The First Police Rogues’ Gallery in America.

“Photos deliver information that can’t be conveyed by words,” she says. “I think our society values words above images, at least when it comes to history.”

Images courtesy the Missouri History Museum.

Charley Jones, alias Williams, spent time in the Missouri State Penitentiary grand larceny prior to December 1858. (Missouri History Museum Press)

(left) John Fight, a native of Ireland, was convicted of grand larceny in St. Louis and went on to serve two years in the Missouri State Penitentiary. | (right) 19-year-old Chas Jamison, from New York, a prisoner in the St. Louis County jail in 1860. (Missouri History Museum Press)

Miller, whose first name is no longer legible, was described by the officer who wrote the note on the back of his photo as a “coneyman” — 19th-century slang for a bank-note counterfeiter. (Missouri History Museum Press)