Posed with casual nonchalance these two Portuguese naval officers - identified by their respective autographs as  “João” and “Augusto” - had their combined portrait taken at one of the oldest European colonies in Asia - Goa, Portuguese India. These two men were part of the crew of the Portuguese warship Diú which along with the vessel Mandovi had been dispatched to the colony with reinforcements during  Dadá-Rane's rebellion against Portuguese forces in 1901.

Overshadowed by the British Raj that surrounded it, Goa had been a Portuguese possession for well over two hundred years before the arrival of the British on the Indian sub-continent. In turn, it would outlast the British Raj by about a dozen years when it was finally annexed by India in 1961.

A somewhat peculiar aside to this image is the resemblance (at least to my eye) of the seated officer on the left to a certain Scottish actor of some note and repute. This may simply be the case of the said resemblance being in the eye of the beholder. The man is in fact 2º Tenente da Armada Real João Maria Rodrigo Pinheiro de Figueira e Melo (b. 1879) the son of the Conde de Arnoso, General de Brigada Bernardo Pinheiro Correia de Melo who was personal secretary to King Carlos I. 2º Tenente da Armada Real João died a few years after this photograph was taken in June 1906.


Cabinet Photograph
B. F. De Souza & Filho - Photographer
Panjim, Goa, Portuguese India
17 February 1902