English Overview

Against a trend to nationalism - a reminder of what has happened in World War One. I want to invite you to a look through a soldiers eyes and experience the war by yourself.

This project deals with the creation of a scientifically annotated photo book, which consists of hundreds of previously unpublished private photographs from the First World War from the point of view of German soldiers. The illustrated book will be published both in digital form and as a printed book in two languages, German and English.

My goal is to compile and share an illustrated book with you. It will consist of a number of private photography albums of a German officer from the First World War. The book will be composed of the pictures of the albums, comments, and translations, to share my research with you.

At work with a dog.

The Project and the Background

My name is Marius Moneth. I am a Ph.D. student at the Heinrich Heine University of Düsseldorf. I am a bachelor and a master in history and am specialized in image history. As an additional subject, I studied English, which enabled me to translate the albums and to compose the illustrated book in English, too. In my scientific career, I have devoted a great deal of attention to the "Pictorial Turn" which is the use of historical sciences on visual sources. Thanks to that, I will have the opportunity to compile the commented photo book and share it with you.

In my photo book, you will get an impression of how the soldiers lived and died on the battlefield. The pictures will tell a story about life in war. I want to describe them as objective as possible so that nobody with an agenda can change the message of the pictures.

An unique collection of picture and photo albums.

During the research for my doctoral thesis, I came across a unique collection of picture and photo albums. Generally, a soldier leaves behind only 1-2 albums about his time in the war. Here, however, nine albums report from the experiences of one person. During my scientific career, I have been working intensively on these photographs and I have concluded that the public should also get an insight into these outstanding photo albums.

The selected convolute is a real historical treasure. It consists of eight memory albums and a postcard album with about 591 photos and pictures from the point of view of German soldiers. After looking through and analyzing the albums, I am sure you will get a unique insight into the First World War.

Hunt in the trenches.

You get an impression of how the soldiers lived and died on the battlefield. If you look at the albums, you will also find rare brilliant shots of the war zone in France, which, among other things, capture some of the cruelty of the war. At the same time, the albums were broadly assembled and you can discover tanks from the later course of the war, aircraft's, guns and you can get an impression of the area behind enemy lines. Even architecture-interested people are getting their money's worth. Some beautiful buildings you can see on the pictures no longer exist today. You get an oppressive, but also a unique impression of life in the First World War.

Happy together.

The photos from the albums show the life in the trenches and the destructive results of the war from the personal experience of an officer in the First World War with private, individual and personal insights.

Insight in the albums.

Goal of the Project

In order to reach the widest possible mass of interested people, the book will appear both digital and in print version.

The digital pictures convince by their practical handling, as they occupy no space in the bookshelf and one can digitally zoom into the pictures.If one wants to deal more extensively with the originals, they are significantly better on a physical object to admire. The images simply look more lively and expressive. For this reason, I decided to create a hardcover photo book.

A second insight in the albums.

A Preview

At this point, I would like to present a preview of the work I can offer you.

As a historian, one should contextualize a photo stock and put it in the right historical context.

At first, you take care of the origin of the albums.

I try to find, if possible, the author of the albums, and this works as follows:



Because of a photo in the fourth album, I could make out the officer who created the albums. You can often recognize him in other photos, too.

Robert Lichte (middle) and comrades.

Robert Lichte with Iron Cross II.

You can find that the Iron Cross II class, which he carries in the upper photo, is included on the cover of the ninth album. You can only wear The Iron Cross II on the day when it was awarded. Therefore, the photo was probably made at this time. The Iron Cross II was awarded to fighters and non-combatants (officials and nurses). It differed in the band on the cross. Soldiers were awarded the Iron Cross II with a black band with white side stripes, non-combatants with a white band with black side stripes. You can see that this award was achieved in battle.

Iron Cross II.

The name of the officer can be determined from the postcards in the 9th postcards album. All postcards are either addressed to or written by Robert Lichte.

From this postcard, further information can be deducted, for example, the rank and unit of the officer. Robert Lichte held the rank of a medical officer in the 1st Company of the Infantry Regiment of Sparr No. 16, deployed on the 3rd West Front. This can be understood in the addressing and the postmark.

Postcard.

In addition, here a picture during an operation. A very rare picture, since photographers were usually not allowed in the medical area. For this reason, this photograph could also have been prepared and staged for the photographer to bring relatives closer to his everyday life as medical staff.

The man on the far left prepared the bandages and the man on the middle left is monitoring the anesthesia, presumably with either. The man in the right middle is the surgeon who cares about the wound of the patient lying in the middle, and finally the person who is watching the patients pulse.

During medical operation.

Additionally, you can see in that photo that the shoulder pads of the uniform show a 16, which indicates the 16th infantry regiment.

In addition, the albums show pictures from 1915 to 1918. Below are a few highlights:

The next picture shows an area in Lille after the explosion. On January 11, 1916, at 3:30 am, a massive explosion destroyed the German ammunition camp in Lille. An orange light beam illuminated the sky and the explosion could be heard in the Netherlands eyewitnesses said. 21 factories and 738 houses were destroyed. There were 134 dead, 104 of which were civilians, 30 were German soldiers, 116 were heavy, and about 290 were injured.

Explosion accident in Lille.

On this photo, you can see a German biplane with pilot and a downed french pilot at the tour. The search for the aircraft number shows that the pilot was Hellmuth Riensberg. He flew a Pfalz D.III in Jasta 10 (Jagdstaffel). He died on January 18, 1918, at 10.30 am in a crash right after a dogfight.

Two pilots.

This image shows an aerial view taken from a reconnaissance aircraft. You can see a castle and its surroundings, together with a small castle grounds.

Castle Grounds.

The last preview shows a group of soldiers in front of a well-fortified light bunker. You can see the morning shave by a comrade. The observing eye can recognize several well-known faces from the operations picture as well as an officer sitting with naked feet in the foreground on a chair. The picture title is "Life in the Trench".

Life in the trenches.

The book should look like that. Without the 2013.





As seen in:

Daily Mail Online

The SUN Online

Geschichte-Wissen

http://www.demotivateur.fr/article/la-premiere-guerre-mondiale-vue-a-travers-une-serie-de-cliches-incroyables-pris-par-un-officier-allemand-9290