Susan

English born who emigrated to New Zealand and settled in Auckland. Martin founded a private academy, where he was headmaster until 1874 and proved to be a gifted teacher but retired from the profession in 1879 due to failing health. He then concentrated on photography. During 1879 he returned to Europe, and while in London studied the latest innovations in photographic techniques and processes. On his return to Auckland he opened a photographic business with a studio on the corner of Queen and Grey streets in partnership with W.H.T. Partington. Martin visited the area of Tarawera and Rotomahana many times and was there on the eve of the eruption of Mt Tarawera in 1886. He also appears to have visited several Pacific Islands, including Fiji and Samoa. Martin gained an international reputation for his ethnological and topographical photographs. His work was exhibited in London at the Colonial and Indian Exhibition of 1886 and he won a gold medal at the Exposition coloniale in Paris in 1889.