Rare Photographs from Wartime Archives
By Bob Carruthers
Pen & Sword, 2015
Covering subjects such as recruitment, training, embarkation, the retreat from Mons, and the battles of First and Second Ypres, this slim volume draws on the relatively few photographs that are available of this period of the war to give a pictorial record of the early campaigns.
Some of the photos are quite well known but there are likely to be some new pictures for many readers. The pictures speak for themselves, with only limited captions to accompany them. Brief introductions to the chapters give some limited context, but this is not a comprehensive account of the battles, nor does it pretend to be.
The pictures are a mix of the staged and those grabbed moments depicting trench life and some of the action that took place. Picture quality is good considering the age of the photos and the no doubt small size of many of the originals. Most sobering is looking upon the unnamed faces and wondering the fate of those men; how many made it through to the end of the wear unscathed?
Frustratingly none of the sources, archives, or copyright details are listed, which would have been a useful inclusion for researchers and students of the war.
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The British at First and Second Ypres (Images of War)
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