Photographers > John Warwick Brooke
(519) D.757 - After duty, anti-aircraft gunners indulge in the old-time winter sport
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| First World War 'Official Photographs' > Photographers > John Warwick Brooke > (519) D.757 - After duty, anti-aircraft gunners indulge in the old-time winter sport |
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| Permanent URL | https://digital.nls.uk/74548058 |
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| Description | With their battery of guns immediately behind them, these anti-aircraft gunners take a light-hearted break from the war to take part in a peaceful fight. As can be seen from the grouped lorries, this is a motorised battery of anti-aircraft guns which may have set up a camp here. 'Archie' and 'flak' were the slang terms used by British soldiers for anti-aircraft fire, so this would probably have been called an 'Archie' battery. One defensive tactic employed by anti-aircraft batteries was the 'barrage’ technique. This strategy consisted of identifying a particular piece of air space and then giving this air space blanket coverage. Barrage balloons were also used to force aeroplanes into specially designated air corridors that subsequently received an extra concentration of gunfire, known as ack-ack fire. Battery commanders also used telescopes in order to track enemy aeroplanes and predict their future position. [Original reads: 'BRITISH OFFICIAL PHOTOGRAPH FROM THE WESTERN FRONT. Snow at the Front. After duty, anti-aircraft gunners indulge in the old-time winter sport.'] |
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| Description | John Warwick Brooke, of the Topical Press Agency, was the second British official war photographer to go to the Western Front in 1916. The demands placed on he and his colleague, Ernest Brooks, were heavy. They had to take as many photographs as possible, with as much variety as possible, a difficult task for two men covering an army of over two million. Despite this, Warwick Brooke managed to take what would become some of the most memorable images of World War I. As an officially appointed photographer, Warwick Brooke was assigned to the Western Front to follow the progress of the British Army. During his time there, between 1916 and 1918, Warwick Brooke is estimated to have taken over 4,000 photographs. |
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| Description | Photographs by named photographers. |
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| Description | Black-and-white photographs mainly of the Western Front during the First World War. Official British war photographers took many of them for propaganda purposes. Unless otherwise stated, titles are the photographs' original captions. From the papers of Field Marshal (Earl) Haig (1861-1928). The Haig Papers also contain Douglas Haig’s diaries. |
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| Shelfmark | Acc.3155 |
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