Darge Photographic Company collection of negatives

Studio portrait of 1785 Private (Pte) Thomas Benjamin Williams. A labourer from Maryborough, Victoria prior to enlistment, Pte Williams embarked with the 2nd Reinforcements 29th Battalion from Melbourne on HMAT Demosthenes on 29 October 1915. Later wounded in the left arm he was evacuated to England. Following his recovery he served with the Australian Corps Headquarters before returning to his unit. He returned to Australia on 1 May 1919. 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.