Darge Photographic Company collection of negatives

Group portrait of (left to right) 2068 Private (Pte) Martin Burton Lamb, 2000 Pte George Alfred Close and 2004 Pte Gordon Cooper. Prior to enlistment Pte Lamb was a timber worker from Beech Forest via Colac, Victoria, Pte Close was a grocer also from Beech Forest via Colac, Victoria and Pte Cooper was a labourer from Purrumbeet, via Weerite, Victoria. All three men embarked with the 3rd Reinforcements, 29th Battalion from Melbourne on HMAT Ballarat on 18 February 1916. Pte Lamb was later wounded in the left shoulder and invalided to England. After recovering he transferred to the 1st Machine Gun Battalion and was admitted to hospital suffering from appendicitis. He was subsequently hospitalised for the second time suffering from scabies and influenza. After recovering he re-joined his unit and was wounded in the back and again invalided to England. Following his recovery he served with the 1st Australian Dermatological Hospital. During this time he took the opportunity to marry and returned to Australia on 18 December 1919. Pte Close was wounded in the arms and right leg and evacuated to England. Due to the severity of his wounds he returned to Australia on 5 April 1917 and was medically discharged. Pte Cooper later transferred to the 8th Light Trench Mortar Battery and was invalided to hospital suffering from influenza. On 27 November 1918, aged 19, he succumbed to his illness and was buried in the Abbeville Community Cemetery Extension, France. It was later disclosed that his correct name was Gordon Cooper Brown. 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.