Darge Photographic Company collection of negatives

Portrait of Paul copied for the Cobram Honour Roll. The soldier is probably 1806 Private (Pte) Ernest Clifton Paul, a labourer from Beechworth prior to enlistment, and had previoulsy resided at Cobram, Victoria. He embarked from Melbourne with the 4th Reinforcements, 7th Battalion, aboard HMAT Wiltshire (A18) on 14 April 1915. On 31 May 1915 he died of wounds received at Gallipoli, and was buried at sea off Gaba Tepe. Ernest Paul's brother Albert Paul also served with the 7th Battalion, He was wounded twice at Gallipoli and returned to Australia on 2 November 1915. (See also DACS0294.) During the First World War the Cobram and District Soldiers Fund initiated a project to create a Cobram Honour Roll. It was to include portraits of servicemen who had links to the Cobram area. The Fund arranged for portraits to be copied by the Darge Photographic Company at its Collins Street Studio, Melbourne. Around 100 copy prints were supplied by the Darge company but it is not known if the roll was ever constructed. In the 1930s, the Australian War Memorial purchased 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. The names are transcribed as they appear in the notebooks.