Ipswich Punch

Origins of Punch

The original Punch, or The London Charivari, was first published in Britain by journalist and playwright Henry Mayhew and wood-engraver Ebenezer Landells.  With its first issue released on 17th July 1841, the Punch would remain in print until 1992, with a brief revival between 1996 and 2002.

It was most influential in its early years, appropriating the term cartoon, which had referred to a finished preliminary sketch on card, until the authors of Punch applied it to its satirical political drawings.  Its influence extended across the British Empire, and to other countries, with imitations published in India, Canada, Japan, Türkiye, China, America, and Australia.

Mr Punch

Mr Punch, the mascot and namesake of the periodical, was taken from the popular British seaside hand puppet show, Punch and Judy.  Punch's origins were in the 17th century Italian commedia dell'arte, through the Neapolitan character Pulcinella, or Punchinello.  He made his first recorded debut in England on 9th May 1662.  In the tradition of the Lord of Misrule and tricksters, Mr Punch emerged as a subversive character.  The puppet shows were violent, macabre, unsettling, and with racist overtones.  Punch was depicted with clown-like features, a large hooked nose, disconcerting smile, and with a sartorial style resembling a court jester.

Punch in Australia

Punch was embraced by expatriate satirists in Australia.   Melbourne Punch, the longest running of the Australian Punches, was published between August 1855 and December 1925.  Sydney Punch had a few runs, in 1856, 1857, and between 1864 and 1888.  The Adelaide Punch ran from 1878-1884, and the Tasmanian Punch had two print runs, from 1869-1870 and 1877-1878.  Regional Punches included the Ballarat Punch (1857, 1867-1870), Dalby Punch (1866), and the Hobart Town Punch.  The Queensland Figaro and Punch  was published between 1885 and 1936 in Brisbane.  It formed from the merger of the Queensland Figaro and the Queensland Punch.

Mr Punch Comes to Ipswich: The Punch Club

A cóterie of gentlemen of artistic and literary tastes and talent have very spiritedly combined for the production of a pen-and-ink monthly periodical, entitled Ipswich Punch, the first number of which is now on the table of the reading-room at the School of Arts.  Having glanced over the pages of our young contemporary, we feel much pleasure in extending to him the right hand of fellowship, only regretting that he should be prevented from availing himself of the printer's art.  The illustrations are profuse and excellent, and reflect credit equally on the industry and genius of the artists; and the letter-press, if we may call it so, is (barring some carelessness on the part of the amanuensis) quite up to the mark.

Queensland Times, Ipswich Herald and General Advertiser, Thursday 15 February 1866, p.3

The Ipswich School of Arts Subscription Library (established 1850) relocated to the School of Arts building by early 1865.  Sometime before the end of 1865, Charles Frederick Chubb, a solicitor based in Ipswich, conceived the idea of forming the Ipswich Punch Club.  The club met monthly and, in addition to Charles Chubb, members included:

• • Walter Burkitt (librarian at the School of Arts)
  • Horace Burkitt (Electric Telegraphs Department, son of Walter Burkitt)
  • Edward Chubb (son of Charles, later a Queensland Supreme Court Judge)
  • William Duesbury (architect)
  • William Finucane
  • A. Gaskarth (Australian Shipping and Navigation Company)
  • Arthur ("The Duke") Hamilton (Railway Commissioner's Office, then based in Ipswich)
  • W.H.S. Hindmarsh (auctioneer)
  • J.R. Sothern (printer and organist)
  • Donald Sidney Thistlethwaite (surveyor, Ipswich to Toowoomba railway line)
  • James Ribley Atkinson (surveyor, Ipswich to Toowoomba railway line)
  • G.M. Yates (clerk/accountant, credited with 'excellent penmanship' by the Queensland Times in 1927)

The Punch Club had no treasurer, secretary, president, or editor.   Instead, at the monthly meetings a chairman was elected.  Each member of the Punch Club submitted handwritten and hand-drawn contributions for review and voting.  Whilst most cartoons, poems, essays, and reviews were accepted, there were some contributions rejected each month.  The monthly chairman had the job of binding each edition and presenting the completed manuscript to Walter Burkitt, who would place it on the library table, by the 15th of each month.

Following the meeting, the members of the Punch Club would adjourn for bread, cheese, and beer, and a smoke concert, a popular form of entertainment, for men, in the Victorian era.  The Ipswich smoke concerts enjoyed by the Punch Club included mirth, music, sleight of hand, and "frivolities of various kinds."  The Punch Club operated on similar principals to Charles Dickens' Pickwick Club, namely that each member paid his own expenses, with the exception of the souffle, which was paid for alphabetically.  

The Ipswich Punch  was released on the 15th of each month of 1866 (with the exception of July, which was printed on the 16th).  After a hiatus of several years, new editions of Punch were available on the table of the School of Arts Library from March 1870 to May 1871, and published on the 1st of the month.  

When Atkinson compiled his memoirs in 1909, he wrote:

the Club eventually broke up much in the usual way - members scattering in all directions and consequently the issue ceased.

The Ipswich Punch

The members of the Punch Club had lofty ideas about Ipswich's place in the colony of Queensland.  Punch contributors imagined Ipswich as the "Modern Athens", with elevated literary pretentions (to be fair, prior to Federation, Ipswich did have at least thirteen newspapers and periodicals, as well as poetry and verse being written and published in the town). 

The Ipswich Punch combined cartoons with sharp satirical commentary on local and colonial politicians and events.  In early 1866, Ipswich Punch took delight in lampooning former Mayor John Pettigrew, after he lost the mayoral vote to Ipswich's first Mayor, John Murphy.  Glasgow-born Colonial Secretary (Premier) and Member for Ipswich, Arthur Macalister appears frequently in the pages in both verse and cartoon, as a bank collapse in London sparked a "loans affair", which would bring down Macalister's government.  Political affairs would continue to absorb much of Mr Punch's attention throughout its two runs.

The construction of the railway, the first stage of which had only opened a year earlier, also fell victim to the bank collapse, with this fodder for the Punch Club's pens.  The Club also had much to say on railway etiquette, labourers, and future routes. 

Migration and Queensland's immigration agent, Henry Jordan, were subjected to heavy criticism by the creators of Punch, who thought the new migrants of questionable quality and work ethic.

Beyond the political satire, the manuscript pages contain letters to the editor, advertisements, public notices, nursery rhymes, mock civil service exam questions, theatre and lecture reviews, and attacks on the dusty and inferior township of Brisbane.

Ipswich's Mr Punch was depicted as less physically violent than his hand puppet namesake, and rarely used his slapstick, preferring words and cartoons as his satirical weapon of choice.

The Fate of The Ipswich Punch

After the last edition was released in May 1871, the bound volumes of the Ipswich Punch stayed in the Reading Room, of the Ipswich School of Arts Library, despite efforts by some museums to obtain the volumes.  They remained with the Ipswich School of Arts Library after it departed the School of Arts building for the Soldiers' Memorial Hall in 1921, and they were still talked about, from time to time, when the Queensland Times would reminisce about their once 'young contemporary', and the 'happy body of leading lights' who contributed to the manuscript, particularly as each member of the Club passed on.

In 1935, 300 books from the Ipswich School of Arts Library were sold by the library committee to the John Oxley Memorial Library for £30.  When the Chairman of the Library Committee, Mayor A.T. Stephenson, was approached by the Queensland Times and asked if the only existing copies of the Ipswich Punch were included in the sale, he replied 'I believe so, the money we received for the books will be of considerable benefit to the School of Arts'. 

Mr H.J.J. Sparks, secretary of the John Oxley Memorial Library, explained to the Queensland Times, that his library was endeavouring to collect the great majority of valuable books in all the various city and town libraries in the State, as he, and his committee, felt that 'such valuable volumes, especially on Australiana, would be far better in a national institution than scattered more or less haphazardly over Queensland.'  They had already purchased four or five collections by the time they reached Ipswich, and had hopes of acquiring another 15 or 16.

Mr. W.H. Brown, a resident of Brisbane, remarked to the Queensland Times, that 'It would be very difficult to place a value on that book [the Ipswich Punch] - I cannot understand the Ipswich Library letting it go.'  In a letter to the editor, J.W. Ingram, sen. (son of J.H. Ingram, former librarian at the School of Arts), wrote that he was 'greatly surprised' to read that the Punch had been sold: 'Had they received the £30 for those alone it would not have been full value ... Seeing that these books were so full of the early history of our city, I think it a shame that they should have been disposed of in this way.'

In the late 1970s, the renamed Ipswich Municipal Library obtained a copy of the Ipswich Punch on microfilm.  Selected cartoons started appearing in a number of Ipswich histories; however, the Punch remained mostly forgotten. 

As part of celebrations for 175 years of Libraries in Ipswich, State Library of Queensland has generously digitised the volumes of Ipswich Punch, gifting the digital files to Ipswich Libraries for inclusion on the Picture Ipswich website.  Picture Ipswich volunteers have enthusiastically worked on transcribing the archaic language and small handwriting, and each edition is being meticulously researched, to bring Punch alive to a new generation of readers.