Darge Photographic Company collection of negatives

Studio portrait of 5903 Driver Thomas Vennell, 12th Reinforcements, 1st Field Artillery Brigade. A labourer of Newcastle, NSW prior to enlistment, he originally embarked from Sydney but after suffering rheumatic fever he was disembarked in Melbourne and sent to hospital. After recovering, on 9 November 1915 he embarked again for overseas service and was assigned to the 3rd Field Artillery Brigade. He was killed in action on 25 August 1916, ten days after he arrived in France. This is one of a series of photographs taken by the Darge Photographic Company which had a permit 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.