Baring, Alexander, flourished 1861-1886 : Alexander Baring was a naval Sub-Lieutenant on the H.M.S. Zealous originating from Plymouth, which reached station headquarters at Esquimalt in July, 1867. His name is recorded in British Navy Lists as active until 1872, when he retired on half-pay as a lieutenant, in which capacity his name appears at least until 1886.
A search into British Navy Lists revealed the possible former owner of the album, also presumed to be the photographer who created the images, as Lieutenant Alexander Baring, who joined the Royal Navy in 1861, and was commissioned in June 1862. Baring was not one of the officers on board H.M.S. Zealous in 1867 when it was sent to British Columbia to become the flagship of the British Pacific Fleet. Most of the photographs in the album record a journey made in 1869 - a photo from Portsmouth in 1869; another photograph of the British flying squadron lead by HMS Liverpool which left Portsmouth in July 1869, which the album owner noted as being "the ship I took passage out to Bermuda in, to join....". The British Navy List for December 1869 notes (p. 210) that Baring was a sub-lieutenant (commissioned 8 November 1869) on board HMS Revenge, which was likely one of the flying squadron mentioned. In a history of HMS Zealous, it is noted that the ship sailed from Esquimalt to Panama in 1870 to meet a replacement crew being transported there by HMS Revenge, and in the British Navy List of October 1870 (p. 187) Baring is listed as being a sub-lieutenant on board HMS Zealous as of 19 January 1870. The Nova Gallery Album also contains a photo dated 1870 of Gibraltar, an undated photo of Madeira, and an 1870 photo of Port Royal, Jamaica. Finally, there are photographs of HMS Revenge in the harbour at Colon, Panama (on the West Indies coast), and of HMS Zealous in Panama. By 24 May 1870, Baring appears to have arrived at the Pacific Coast station, since there is a photo of the ships of the Pacific Fleet manning the yards in honour of the Queen's Birthday on May 24.
The great interest of this album is its record of HMS Zealous itself, and of the Pacific Fleet headquarters at Esquimalt. HMS Zealous was one of the three ships (the others being HMS Royal Alfred and HMS Repulse) forming the second group of wooden steam battleships selected in 1860 by the Royal Navy for conversion to ironclads, in response to the perceived threat to Britain offered by the large French ironclad building program. To match the French deployment of armored corvettes in the Pacific Ocean, the Admiralty ordered HMS Zealous to sail for the west coast of Canada shortly after she was completed. Upon her arrival the ship became the flagship, reaching her operational base at Esquimalt in July 1867. In January 1870 she picked up a fresh crew at Panama brought out by the two-decker HMS Revenge. After several years on station, she was relieved by HMS Revenge as flagship in 1872 and started for home. Her bottom had not been cleaned since she had left Great Britain and she could only make a maximum of 7 knots under sail or steam so her return voyage took five months. HMS Zealous struck a rock while sailing through the English Narrows in the southwestern coast of Chile but was only slightly damaged. She was refitted in Plymouth in April 1873 and then became guard ship at Southampton until 1875, when she was paid off. The ship was sold for scrap in September 1886. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HMS_Zealous_(1864)for this information.
The Wikipedia article incorrectly stated that the Zealous mostly stayed in harbour. The ship visited Hawaii at some point, as there are photographs from her visit in the album; there are also photos of the ship in San Francisco in July 1870, a date which can be pinpointed by the existence of a photo of a cricket team from the Zealous playing against the California Eleven - an event recorded in San Francisco histories as having occurred on July 25, 1870 (the California team won). Most of the photos in the album are undated, and some of them have no titles, but the majority deal with naval life in Esquimalt, including portraits of other ships in the squadron, of the naval facilities (including the photographer's studio on the grounds of the naval hospital), and of the nearby Indigenous villages. There is also a drawing of HMS Charybdis in drydock, and a lithograph advertising the HMS Zealous Officers Amateur Dramatic Company dated 1871. Some of the photographs in the album are likely to have been taken by Charles Boduthra, a photographer whom photo historian David Mattison has identified as being a sketch artist and photographer employed on board HMS Zealous ca. July 1867 to 1869 (see https://cameraworkers.davidmattison.com/getperson.php?personID=I411&tree=cw18581950).
HMS Zealous sailed home in 1872, but the ship appears to have anchored at the Juan Fernandez Islands off the coast of Chile, as there are several photographs of the ship in harbour, and a photograph of the memorial to Alexander Selkirk, the original Robinson Crusoe, which had been placed on Alexander Slekirk Island, one of the San Juan Fernandez Islands in 1869 (see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alexander_Selkirk).
As stated, HMS Zealous returned to England late in 1872, the last year that Baring's name is recorded in British Navy Active Lists. He retired on half-pay as a lieutenant, in which capacity his name appears at least until 1886. A few photographs in the album dated 1885 are recorded as being at "Etretah", which may be the fashionable French resort at Etretat on the English Channel. There are many Baring families in England, but nothing more about his family or his later life is known. His naval service record at the National Archives in Kew seems to indicate that he passed away sometime in 1919, but access to the full record has not been obtained.
The Nova Gallery/Zealous/Baring Album is a fascinating document by a British Naval officer in the 1870-1872 on the west coast of Canada. Although many of the photographs (all presumably collodion prints, since the photographer records a notation about spilling collodion on one of the photos) were copied as PA-numbers, only one has been digitized.
Fortunately the Vancouver City Archives also owns an important photo album about the British naval presence at Esquimalt, formerly belonging to Rear-Admiral George Fowler Hastings, who was posted to Esquimalt from 1867-1869. The Hastings family album contains 274 albumen prints of family members, ships, buildings, aboriginal peoples, early scenes in Vancouver, Nanaimo, Victoria, the Cariboo Road, Esquimalt and sites in South America. Also included are copies of an engraving of the Earl of Derby, news clippings and illustrations of Sir James Brooke, Rajah of Sarawak and Admiral Sir James Gordon, Governor of Greenwich Hospital. More than 250 of these photographs are available digitally at https://searcharchives.vancouver.ca/george-fowler
