Who was the world’s first war photographer?
Q: Who was the first photographer to shoot a war? Jamie N. from Raleigh, N.C.
A: That distinction would go to photographer Roger Fenton, an Englishman, who took his “photographic van” on the road to shoot the Crimean War in 1855. He was assigned to the job by publisher Thomas Agnew.
The Crimean War was conflict between Russia and the combined forces of France, England, Sardinia and Ottoman Empire largely based on the Crimean Peninsula. It was fought to determine who would be the sovereign authority over the Holy Land. Over 750,000 died in the conflict.
With photographic assistant Marcus Sparling, Fenton was able to produce over 350 usable prints. However, since his technology required long times of exposure, most of his photos were posed or of battlefields after the action occurred. This photo of cannon balls on a road has come under criticism, since there’s also this photo of the road without cannon balls. It’s unclear whether or not the cannonballs were purposely placed on the roads or moved off.
Since Fenton was considered an official war photographer and the government wanted the photographs to offset the negative press that the newspapers in London were giving the war, Fenton stayed away from shooting the bodies of dead soldiers.
However, this less than truthful way of photographing a war would continue during the Civil War. Since photographers were again hampered by the fact that they couldn’t shoot moving objects would instead shoot posed solider shots and aftermaths of the battlefields. Instead of staying away from the bodies of dead soldiers, photographers would actually rearrange them to get the point across about the death and destruction of the war.
Leave a comment!