Archive Note
Born Alfred Charles George Schmidt in Karlsbad, Bohemia, he adopted the name South around the 1890s as his tattooing career began and worked from premises in London, with sources placing him on Cockspur Street. He gained public visibility in May 1898 when he stepped in to tattoo at the Royal Aquarium in place of Tom Riley, and again in 1899 when he gave evidence at the inquest into a client who died of blood poisoning after a long chest session, testifying to his needle hygiene. He is credited in machine histories with an early twin-coil tattoo machine dated to 1899, built around a doorbell-type assembly in a plate-steel box. He advertised work in any design and all colors and remained a visible figure into the Edwardian period. His exact birth and death years are not established.
Lineage
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