Outdoor portrait of a large number of Prisoners of War (POW) gathered around an open grave in a ...

Accession Number P03236.315
Collection type Photograph
Object type Black & white - Print silver gelatin
Maker Unknown
Place made Germany
Date made c December 1918
Conflict First World War, 1914-1918
Copyright

Item copyright: Copyright expired - public domain

Public Domain Mark This item is in the Public Domain

Description

Outdoor portrait of a large number of Prisoners of War (POW) gathered around an open grave in a cemetery behind a church. A handwritten note accompanying the photograph reads "Funeral of Lewis" and is probably the funeral of 5770 Sapper George Young Lewis, 2nd Australian Tunnelling Company, from Sulphur Creek, Tasmania. Sapper Lewis enlisted on 29 March 1916 at the age of 28 and embarked for overseas with the Tunnelling Companies November 1916 Reinforcements on 25 October 1916 aboard HMAT Ulysses. He was captured at Nieuport, Belgium, on 10 July 1917 and held as a POW in Germany. On 5 December 1918 he died of Spanish Grippe (pneumonia) and was buried in Lechfeld, Cemetery, Graben, Germany. In 1924 he was reinterred in Niederzwehren Cemetery, Kassell, Germany. One of a series of over 400 photographs sent by Australian POWs in German camps to Miss M. E. Chomley, Secretary, Prisoners Department, Australian-British Red Cross Society, London. Original album housed in AWM Research Centre at RC00864, Album image number 375.

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