Darge Photographic Company collection of negatives

Studio portrait of 2147 Private (Pte) William Bennie Cochran, 21st Battalion. A grocer from Beaufort, Victoria prior to enlistment, Pte Cochran embarked with the 4th Reinforcements from Melbourne on HMAT Hororata on 27 September 1915. Later wounded in action at Pozieres, he was evacuated to hospital. Following his recovery he rejoined his unit and was killed in action on at Broodseinde on 4 October 1917, aged 36. Having no known grave, he is commemorated on the Menin Gate Memorial, Ypres, Belgium. This is one of a series of photographs taken by the Darge Photographic Company which had the concession 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.