More Finds at the Local Antique Shop - World War One Soldier

Soldiers jump out at me when browsing through orphan photo collections in antique shops. Coveted by many collectors, the soldiers stand as representatives of events that we automatically recognize as historically significant. Their faces seem haunted by the context of their story. The photos that I usually find like this in a shop have nothing indicating the subject of, or the story behind, the picture. This one did and that is what attracted me to it:

"Rec'd at Brest, France. May 23, 1919. Waiting to sail for home U.S.A. Says (?) I'm sending this to give you a faint idea of what I looked like as a soldier."








The first thing I noticed was the slight silvering of the image. It has likely been kept next to an acidic piece of paper (perhaps an envelope?) in an inadequate environment for many years. Proper boxing and climate controls will slow down that deterioration.

I next noticed how young the soldier looks. I realized that I was placing this man in the context of my own life, when many people are starting to look "young" to me. In reality, the people who survived this war were about 70 years older than I. History is a funny thing in that one tends to transport oneself to the time one is contemplating. Portraits drive home the point that the person who looks back at us through the picture could have been someone we knew, if we were just born during another time. The people from history are not all that different from us.

World War I ended in November 1918. This image has the date May 1919. I therefore know that this soldier survived. He talks about what he "looked like as a soldier." He is through with his service. Some of the "haunted" feeling I got from a first glimpse at the gentleman's face is gone. I now feel relief.

I wonder why he sent this home to the U.S. and to whom. The postcard is not dated or stamped. Can I assume he sent it in an envelope? Was the writing on the back of the image written by him or copied from a letter by the recipient. The use of the word that I think is "Says" seems to indicate that maybe this was copied. Are the people to whom he is writing waiting for him overseas? Was he unable to write to them and send a photo during the war for some reason? He had his whole life ahead of him. What was he planning? As he wrote these words, was he too thinking about his service ending and wondering what came next - he looking forward and me looking back?
***
The last U.S. veteran of World War One died about a month ago.   Archives are working hard to preserve the legacy of the Great War. It becomes harder to preserve memories once the people who lived through the stories are gone.
Europeana, a collaborative project that gives access to Europe's cultural heritage, recently put out a call asking for help with World War One records:
Crowdsourcing history: European museums need your help to digitise World War One records is one example of ways professionals and non-professionals can work together to save our heritage. This project and similar ones in repositories around the world are part of the important work that cultural heritage professionals do to ensure that history is not forgotten.

More Finds at the Local Antique Shop

Carte-de-visite from Manchester, NH

How lucky I was to find this posted thesis about carte-de-visite when I set out ot do a bit of research on today's photograph: CARTE-DE-VISITE CULTURE IN MANCHESTER NH: A CASE STUDY by Carolyn Jambard-Sweet, 2006.


According to the thesis' author, a multi-lens camera allowed a photographer to create 8 carte-de-visite negatives in a sitting. "The photographs were then affixed to a paper card which was traded with friends and family by hand or delivered by mail, often ending up as part of a miniature portrait collection in an elegant album designed specifically for cartes-de-visite."

The woman in my picture sits with such an album on the desk in front of her. Her image is a typical portrait made for sharing with friends, but it also makes a clever statement about its own purpose. The sitter intended this image to end up in friends' photo collections similar to the one she includes here. (I wonder if the use of the album as a prop was her idea or the photographer's idea.)

Calling cards were once left in the drawing
room by house guests.

"Those albums are fast taking the place and doing the work of the long cherished card basket.  That institution has had a long swing of it.  It was a good thing to leave on the table that your morning-caller while waiting in the drawing room till you were presentable, might see what distinguished company you kept, and what very unexceptionable people were in the habit of coming to call on you.  But the card-basket was not comparable to the album as an advertisement of your
claims to gentility...." (Dan  Younger, 16.  As quoted from “The Carte de Visite,” The Photographic News, May 1862)

Information about the photographer of the portrait is supplied by the cards accompanying envelope. The thesis author found our photographer, Mr. S. Piper, in the local city directory, which stated that he was practicing at the corner of Elm and Amherst streets. He worked at his craft from the 1860s through the 1880s with his business outliving those of many of his contemporaries. His obituary described him as one of the best known photographers in Manchester, NH. It is believed that he photographed most of the residents of the city.

Though this card is far from unique, it has an interesting story to tell us about the time period in which it was made and the person who made it...I only wish that it were labeled so we could know more about its subject than her typical late nineteenth century hairstyle and dress.