The Sooty Opossum. (Phalangista Fuliginosa)

Harriet Scott (1830 - 1907)

Scott and her sister Helena Forde (1832-1910) (nee Scott) were born in the Rocks area of Sydney to Harriet Calcott, daughter of an ex-convict, and Alexander Walter Scott, a wealthy man who would become known in the colony as an entomologist, grazier and entrepreneur. Helena and Harriet (known as the Scott sisters) were two of 19th century Australia’s most prominent natural history illustrators and possibly the first professional female illustrators in the country. In 1846, Harriet and Helena, then aged 16 and 14, moved from Sydney to the isolated Ash Island in the Hunter River estuary with their mother, Harriet Calcott, and father, entomologist and entrepreneur Alexander Walker Scott. There, surrounded by unspoilt native vegetation and under the inspiring tutelage of their artistic father, their shared fascination with the natural world grew. For almost 20 years, the sisters lived and worked on the island, faithfully recording its flora and fauna, especially the butterflies and moths. The sisters continued to draw and paint commercially for the rest of their lives. Harriet drew botanical illustrations for the 1879, 1884 and 1886 editions of the Railway Guide to New South Wales, and they both executed designs for Australia’s first Christmas cards in 1879. Harriet died at Granville NSW in 1907 and Helena in 1910. Reference; Australian Museum.

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