Accession Number | DA18447 |
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Collection type | Photograph |
Object type | Black & white - Glass original half plate negative |
Maker |
Darge Photographic Company |
Place made | Australia: Victoria, Melbourne, Broadmeadows |
Date made | c 8 August 1917 |
Conflict |
First World War, 1914-1918 |
Copyright |
Item copyright: Copyright expired - public domain This item is in the Public Domain |
Darge Photographic Company collection of negatives
Studio portrait of 3610 Private (Pte) Zalmona Murray Watson, 3rd Pioneer Battalion from Carlton, Victoria. A 19 year old electrician prior to enlisting on 4 July 1917, he embarked for overseas with the 8th Reinforcements from Melbourne on 21 November 1917 aboard HMAT Nestor. After further training in Egypt and England, he transferred to the 60th Infantry Battalion in February 1918 and deployed to France in April 1918. Pte Watson was killed in action at Morlancourt, France on 5 July 1918 and is buried in the Mericourt-L'Abbe Communal Cemetery Extension, France. This is one of a series of photographs taken by the Darge Photographic Company which had the concession to take photographs at the Broadmeadows and Seymour army camps during the First World War. In the 1930s, the Australian War Memorial purchased the original glass negatives from Algernon Darge, along with the photographers' notebooks. The notebooks contain brief details, usually a surname or unit name, for each negative.