Darge Photographic Company collection of negatives

Studio portrait of Aarons Les, believed to be 13251 Private (Pte) Leslie Aarons, Australian Army Medical Corps from North Melbourne, Victoria. A 23 year old bootmaker prior to enlisting on 23 July 1915, he embarked for overseas with the Special Reinforcements from Melbourne on 7 March 1916 aboard HMAT Karoola (A63). After arriving in Egypt, he joined the 14th Field Ambulance and proceeded to France with them in June 1916. Following service in France and Belgium, Pte Aarons arrived back in Australia on 12 July 1919. 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.