A new exhibition is set to open at the Justice & Police Museum in Sydney, Australia, this weekend, showing a collection of forensic crime photography from the early 20th century.

“In the early part of the last century, police routinely went to the places that more genteel citizens did their best to avoid,” said a spokesperson for the museum.

“The police were just doing their job, gathering evidence, interviewing witnesses, taking photographs, but now, nearly a century later, the information they collected offers us an intimate record of everyday life in early 20th century Sydney.”

The images were rescued from a flooded warehouse in the 1980s and taken to the museum which has used them to create the new exhibition.

“In most cases we have no name and no date,” said Peter Doyle, curator of the exhibition. “Each photograph offers an intimate, raw and often hauntingly beautiful record of the mysterious people and dark places of a lost Sydney.”

The collection features more than 300 photographs and will be on display until November next year. Details: www.hht.net.au