Darge Photographic Company collection of negatives

Studio portrait of 4548 Private (Pte) Hector McDonald. A farmer from Yatchaw via Hamilton, Victoria prior to enlistment, Pte McDonald embarked with 14th Reinforcements, 7th Battalion from Melbourne on HMAT Themistocles on 28 January 1916. After arriving in the Middle East he transferred to the 57th Battalion and was appointed as Lance Corporal and admitted to hospital suffering from bronchitis. Following his recovery he joined the 59th Battalion in France and on 21 December 1916, aged 28, he was killed in action. Having no known grave he is commemorated on the Villers-Bretonneux Memorial. His brother, 7048 Sergeant Andrew McDonald MM also served in the AIF. This is one of a series of photographs taken by the Darge Photographic Company which had a 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.