Description

This photograph shows injured and killed soldiers lying in a field after charging, presumably from a trench to try to gain some ground. 

However, it is not clear whether this is a staged photo or not. While Charles Girdwood’s photographs form an important record, their documentary value must be assessed with caution. Girdwood’s was an explicitly propagandist role on behalf of the war effort in general and the India Office in particular. Some of the scenes at the front appear to be unposed, but a number of images, purportedly showing troops in action, have clearly been staged for the photographer: this could possibly be the case with this photograph. The images are perhaps more significant as an illustration of the use of photography as propaganda, rather than a straight documentary record.  

The Girdwood Collection

This series of several hundred photographs recording the contribution of Indian soldiers to the Allied war effort was produced in 1915 by the Canadian-born photographer Charles Hilton DeWitt Girdwood (1878-1964). As a professional photographer Girdwood had an early connection with India, photographing the Delhi Durbar of 1903, the royal tour of 1905-06 and the Delhi Durbar of 1911. In 1908 he set up a photo agency called Realistic Travels, specialising in stereoscopic photography. 

With the outbreak of war in 1914, Girdwood returned from India and in April 1915 was given permission by the India Office to photograph the work of the Indian military hospitals in Bournemouth and Brighton. From July to September 1915 he worked in France as an official photographer to record Indian and later British troops in the field. In the later part of his time in France he also made ciné film of the campaign, which later appeared under the title With the Empire’s Fighters.