world war 1 photo essay

World War I in Photos: Introduction

• Alan Taylor
• April 27, 2014

A century ago, an assassin, a Serbian nationalist, killed the heir to the throne of Austria-Hungary as he visited Sarajevo. This act was the catalyst for a massive conflict that lasted four years. More than 65 million soldiers were mobilized by more than 30 nations, with battles taking place around the world. Industrialization brought modern weapons, machinery, and tactics to warfare, vastly increasing the killing power of armies. Battlefield conditions were horrific, typified by the chaotic, cratered hellscape of the Western Front, where soldiers in muddy trenches faced bullets, bombs, gas, bayonet charges, and more. On this 100-year anniversary, I've gathered photographs of the Great War from dozens of collections, some digitized for the first time, to try to tell the story of the conflict, those caught up in it, and how much it affected the world. This entry is part 1 of a 10-part series on World War I . In this installment, I hope to give a glimpse of the war's beginnings, and a preview of what is to come.

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Soldiers of an Australian 4th Division field artillery brigade walk on a duckboard track laid across a muddy, shattered battlefield in Chateau Wood, near Hooge, Belgium, on October 29, 1917. This was during the Battle of Passchendaele, fought by British forces and their allies against Germany for control of territory near Ypres, Belgium. #

Nine European Sovereigns at Windsor for the funeral of King Edward VII in May of 1910, four years before the war began. Standing, from left to right: King Haakon VII of Norway, Tsar Ferdinand of Bulgaria, King Manuel II of Portugal, Kaiser Wilhelm II of the German Empire, King George I of Greece and King Albert I of Belgium. Seated, from left to right: King Alfonso XIII of Spain, King-Emperor George V of the United Kingdom and King Frederick VIII of Denmark. Within the next decade, Kaiser Wilhelm II and Tsar Ferdinand's empires would engage in bloody warfare with the nations led by King Albert I and King George V. The war was also a family affair, as Kaiser Wilhelm II was a first cousin to King George V, and an uncle to King Albert I. Of the remaining monarchs pictured, over the next decade one would be assassinated (Greece), three would keep their nations neutral (Norway, Spain, and Denmark), and two would be forced out of power by revolutions. #

In 1914, Austria-Hungary was a powerful and huge country, larger than Germany, with nearly as many citizens. It had been ruled by Emperor Franz Joseph I since 1848, who had been grooming his nephew, Archduke Franz Ferdinand as the heir to the throne. In this photo, taken in Sarajevo on June 28, 1914, a visiting Archduke Franz Ferdinand and his wife, Czech Countess Sophie Chotek, are departing a reception at City Hall. Earlier that morning, on the way to the hall, their motorcade had been attacked by one of a group of Serbian nationalist assassins, whose bomb damaged one car and injured dozens of bystanders. After this photo was taken, the Archduke and his wife climbed into the open car, headed for a nearby hospital to visit the wounded. Just blocks away though, the car paused to turn around, directly in front of another assassin, who walked up to the car and fired two shots, killing both Franz Ferdinand and his wife. #

Assassin Gavrilo Princip (left) and his victim Archduke Franz Ferdinand, both photographed in 1914. Princip, a 19 year old a Bosnian Serb who killed the Archduke, was recruited along with five others by Danilo Ilic, a friend and fellow Bosnian Serb, who was a member of the Black Hand secret society. Their ultimate goal was the creation of a Serbian nation. The conspiracy, assisted by members of Serbia's military, was quickly uncovered, and the attack became a catalyst that would soon set massive armies marching against each other around the world. All of the assassins were captured and tried. Thirteen received medium-to-short prison sentences, including Princip (who was too young for the death penalty, and received the maximum, a 20 year sentence). Three of the conspirators were executed by hanging. Four years after the assassination, Gavrilo Princip died in prison, brought down by tuberculosis, which was worsened by harsh conditions brought on by the war he helped set in motion. #

A Bosnian Serb nationalist (possibly Gavrilo Princip, more likely bystander Ferdinand Behr), is captured by police and taken to the police station in Sarajevo, on June 28, 1914, following the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand, heir to the Austrian-Hungarian throne, and his wife. #

Shortly after the assassination, Austria-Hungary issued a list of demands to Serbia, demanding they halt all anti-Austro-Hungarian activity, dissolve certain political groups, remove certain political officers, and arrest those within its borders who participated in the assassination, among other things -- with 48 hours to comply. Serbia, with the backing of their ally Russia, politely refused to fully comply, and mobilized their army. Soon after, Austria-Hungary, backed by their ally Germany, declared war on Serbia on July 28 1914. A network of treaties and alliances then kicked in, and within a month's time, Germany, Austria-Hungary, Russia, France, Britain, and Japan had all mobilized their armies and declared war. In this photo, taken in August of 1914, Prussian guard infantry in new field gray uniforms leave Berlin, Germany, heading for the front lines. Girls and women along the way greet and hand flowers to them. #

Belgian soldiers with their bicycles in Boulogne, France, 1914. Belgium asserted neutrality from the start of the conflict, but provided a route into France that the German army coveted, so Germany declared it would "treat her as an enemy", if Belgium did not allow German troops free passage. #

The conflict, called the Great War by those involved, was the first large-scale example of modern warfare - technologies still use in battle today were introduced in large scale forms then, some (like chemical attacks) were outlawed and later viewed as war crimes. The newly-invented aeroplane took its place as an observation platform, a bomber, and an anti-personnel weapon, even as an anti-aircraft defense, shooting down enemy aircraft. Here, French soldiers gather around a priest as he blesses an aircraft on the Western Front, in 1915. #

Between 1914 and the war's end in 1918, more than 65 million soldiers were mobilized worldwide - requiring mountains of supplies and gear. Here, on a table set up outside a steel helmet factory in Lubeck, Germany, a display is set up, showing the varying stages of the helmet-making process for Stahlhelms for the Imperial German Army. #

A Belgian soldier smokes a cigarette during a fight between Dendermonde and Oudegem, Belgium, in 1914. Germany had hoped for a swift victory against France, and invaded Belgium in August of 1914, heading into France. The German army swept through Belgium, but was met with stiffer resistance than it anticipated in France. The Germans approached to within 70 kilometers of Paris, but were pushed back a ways, to a more stable position, which would become battlefields lined with trenches, fought over for years. In this opening month of World War I, hundreds of thousands of soldiers and civilians were killed or wounded -- France suffered its greatest single-day loss on August 22nd, when more than 27,000 soldiers were killed by rifle and machine-gun, thousands more wounded. #

German soldiers celebrate Christmas in the field, in December of 1914. #

The front in France, a scene on a battlefield at midnight. Opposing armies were sometimes situated in trenches just yards apart from each other. #

An Austrian soldier, dead on a battleground, in 1915. #

Austro-Hungarian troops executing Serbian civilians, likely ca. 1915. Serbians suffered greatly during the war years, counting more than a million casualties by 1918, including losses in battle, mass executions, and the worst typhus epidemic in history. #

The Japanese fleet off the coast of China in 1914. Japan sided with the United Kingdom and its allies, attacking German interests in the Pacific, including island colonies and leased territories on the Chinese mainland. #

View from an airplane of biplanes flying in formation, ca. 1914-18. #

The Salonica (Macedonian) front, Indian troops at a Gas mask drill. Allied forces joined with Serbs to battle armies of the Central Powers and force a stable front throughout most of the war. #

Unloading of a horse in Tschanak Kale, Turkey, equipment for the Austro-Hungarian army. #

The French battleship Bouvet, in the Dardanelles. It was assigned to escort troop convoys through the Mediterranean at the start of the war. In early 1915, part of a larger group of combined British and French ships sent to clear Turkish defenses of the Dardanelles, Bouvet was hit by at least eight Turkish shells, then struck a mine, which caused so much damage, the ship sank within a few minutes. While a few men survived the sinking and were rescued, nearly 650 went down with the ship. #

1915, British soldiers on motorcycles in the Dardanelles, part of the Ottoman Empire, prior to the Battle of Gallipoli. #

A dog belonging to a Mr. Dumas Realier, dressed as a German soldier, in 1915. #

"Pill box demolishers" being unloaded on the Western Front. These enormous shells weighed 1,400 lbs. Their explosions made craters over 15 ft. deep and 15 yards across. #

A motorcycle dispatch rider studying the details on a grave marker, while in the background an observation balloon is preparing to ascend. The writing on the marker says in German: "Hier ruhen tapfere franzosische Krieger", or Here rest brave French warriors. #

Highlanders, soldiers from the United Kingdom, take sandbags up to the front in 1916. #

British artillery bombards German positions on the Western Front. #

A British officer leads the way "over the top" amid the bursting of German shells. #

American soldiers, members of Maryland's 117th Trench Mortar Battery, operating a trench mortar. This gun and crew kept up a continuous fire throughout the raid of March 4, 1918 in Badonviller, Muerthe et Modselle, France. #

A German soldier throws a hand grenade against enemy positions, at an unknown battlefield during World War I. #

French soldiers, some wounded, at the taking of Courcelles, in the department of Oise, France, in June of 1918. #

A stretcher bearer patrol painfully makes its way through knee-deep mud near Bol Singhe during the British advance in Flanders, on August 20, 1917. #

German soldiers practice with a flame-thrower on April 4, 1917. #

Candor, Oise, France. Soldiers and a dog outside a ruined house in 1917. #

British tanks pass dead Germans who were alive before the cavalry advanced a few minutes before the picture was taken. World War I saw the debut of tank warfare, with varying levels of success, mostly poor. Many of the earlier models broke down frequently, or got bogged down in mud, fell into trenches, or, (slow-moving) were directly targeted by artillery. #

Western Front, German A7V tanks drive through a village near Rheims in 1918. #

Ottoman Turk Machine Gun Corps at Tel esh Sheria Gaza Line, in 1917, part of the Sinai and Palestine Campaign. British troops were battling the the Ottoman Empire (supported by Germany), for control of the Suez Canal, Sinai Peninsula, and Palestine. #

A bridge across the mud flats in Flanders, Belgium, in 1918. #

An aerial view of the Hellish moonscape of the Western Front during World War I. Hill of Combres, St. Mihiel Sector, north of Hattonchatel and Vigneulles. Note the criss-cross patterns of multiple generations of trenches, and the thousands of craters left by mortars, artillery, and the detonation of underground mines. #

A color photograph of Allied soldiers on a battlefield on the Western Front. This image was taken using the Paget process, an early experiment in color photography. #

A German ammunition column, men and horses equipped with gas masks, pass through woods contaminated by gas in June of 1918. #

German soldiers flee a gas attack in Flanders, Belgium, in September of 1917. Chemical weapons were a part of the arsenal of World War I armies from the beginning, ranging from irritating tear gases to painful mustard gas, to lethal agents like phosgene and chlorine. #

Members of the German Red Cross, carrying bottle of liquid to revive those who have succumbed to a gas attack. #

British enter Lille, France, in October of 1918, after four years of German occupation. Beginning in the summer of 1918, Allied forces began a series of successful counteroffensives, breaking through German lines and cutting off supply lines to Austro-Hungarian forces. As Autumn approached, the end of the war seemed inevitable. #

The USS Nebraska, a United States Navy battleship, with dazzle camouflage painted on the hull, in Norfolk, Virginia, on April 20, 1918. Dazzle camouflage, widely used during the war years, was designed to make it difficult for an enemy to estimate the range, heading, or speed of a ship, and make it a harder target. #

A German dog hospital, treating wounded dispatch dogs coming from the front, ca. 1918. #

U.S. Army Company A, Ninth Machine Gun Battalion. Three soldiers man a machine gun set up in railroad shop in Chateau Thierry, France, on June 7, 1918. #

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A World War I Photo Essay

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• Copy URL https://www.pbs.org/newshour/world/photo-essay-world-war-remastered-color

Photo Essay: World War I remastered and in color

For the 100th anniversary of the “war to end all wars,” a team at the Open University in the United Kingdom has been searching through photo archives around the world to find unique and significant images of the conflict . The university hired a photo restoration specialist to restore and color a handful of images. Here’s a sneak peek.

Photo from the London Transport Museum. Restoration by the Open University

Homing pigeons provided critical communications to and from the front, so the British forces developed traveling pigeon lofts built onto the back of busses. For more on the role pigeons played during the conflict, don’t miss Smithsonian Magazine’s “ Closing The Pigeon Gap .”

Photo from the State Library of South Australia. Restoration by the Open University

Photo from The British Library. Restoration by the Open University

Photo from the Canadian Library and Archive. Restoration by the Open University

Chemical weapons were a threat to human and animal alike . Above, Indian infantry wear protective masks in trenches in 1915. Below, a member of the Canadian Veterinary Corps and his horse model protective masks.

View all of the restored images at the Open University .

Travis Daub is Director of Digital at PBS NewsHour.

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44 Autochrome Images Of World War I That Bring The Great War To Life

Captured by albert kahn's fearless photography team, these early color photos of world war i help reveal the human side of the conflict..

World War I took place more than a century ago. As such, it’s easy to see the conflict as a mere speck in history’s rear-view mirror. But Albert Kahn’s World War I photos bring the “war to end all wars” to life.

Thanks to the then-recently invented autochrome, the photographs taken by Kahn’s team of photographers during the conflict are in color. They capture the blue of French uniforms, the crumbling gray ruins of cities like Reims, and the dark, mousy brown of trenches on the frontline.

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In the gallery above, peruse some of the striking photos taken by Albert Kahn's team during World War I. And below, learn more about Kahn's mission to create a "photographic inventory of the surface of the globe."

One Man's Photographic Mission

By trade, Albert Kahn was a banker. But the Frenchman is best known for his photography project, " The Archives of the Planet ," which set out to document different cultures across the world. Between 1909 and 1931, Kahn's team of photographers spread to every corner of the globe. Using the newly invented autochrome, they took vivid color photos of different cultures worldwide.

Kahn envisioned his project as "a kind of photographic inventory of the surface of the globe, occupied and organized by man, such as it presents itself at the beginning of the 20th century." And his team would ultimately take some 72,000 photos of distant places like Syria, India, and Vietnam.

Musée Albert Kahn A young carpet weaver in Algiers, Algeria. Circa 1910-1912.

They documented dancers in Algeria, sprawling public gardens in Afghanistan, and royalty in Albania. And their photos, as Kahn intended, captured a stunning spectrum of the human experience.

But in 1914, some of Albert Kahn's photographers also started photographing something much closer to home: World War I, which began after the assassination of Austrian Archduke Franz Ferdinand .

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The World War I Photographers Working For Albert Kahn

Because Ferdinand had been killed by a Serbian nationalist named Gavrilo Princip , Austria-Hungary, with the support of their ally Germany, declared war on Serbia. But Serbia was supported by Russia, so Germany soon declared war on the Russians — and then on Russia's ally, France. Germany's attack on France, through neutral Belgium and Luxembourg, also drew Great Britain into the conflict. With that, World War I began.

As the Musée Albert Kahn notes, Albert Kahn's World War I photos come from photographers like Auguste Léon, Stéphane Passet, Paul Castelnau, and Georges Chevalier, who documented the conflict as it unfolded.

Musée Albert Kahn Paul Castelnau, as photographed by Auguste Léon.

Photographers like Léon and Passet had long worked on "The Archives of the Planet." Léon was the first professional camera operator recruited by Kahn in 1909 (and he would work on Kahn's photography project until 1930). Before the war, he traveled to places like the Balkans and Egypt. When the worldwide conflict broke out, Léon documented it on Kahn's behalf.

Passet started working with "The Archives of the Planet" in 1912. He had spent most of the pre-war years taking photos of people in countries like China, Mongolia, Japan, Turkey, Morocco, and India. When World War I began, he served in the artillery section of the French Army, but he continued to take photographs for Kahn's archives.

Paul Castelnau, on the other hand, was a photographer with the French Army. His wartime photos were later divided — somewhat haphazardly — between "The Archives of the Planet" and the French Army itself.

Together, they and others captured World War I in stunning color.

Albert Kahn's World War I Photos

World War I ultimately lasted four years. It ushered in a new age of terrifying weapons like mustard gas, machine-gun fire, and artillery attacks from the air, and led to the deaths of millions of people. By the time the war came to an end in 1918, the total number of military and civilian casualties exceeded 40 million, with over 20 million dead and 20 million wounded.

Albert Kahn's World War I photos, however, most often capture wartime life off the battlefield. His photographers took photos of cities left in ruins, soldiers nervously standing in trenches, and doctors tending to patients.

Musée Albert Kahn A young boy in Reims, France holds a gas mask as he sits atop rubble. 1917.

They captured moments like a nurse speaking to a soldier, a priest shoveling away debris, and children playing on decimated streets. In other words, Albert Kahn's World War I photos captured the human side of the conflict.

Remarkably, for the time, they captured these moments in color, making them seem less like a page from a history book and more like "real life."

In the gallery above, peruse some of Albert Kahn's World War I photographs.

After looking through Albert Kahn's World War I photos, peruse this collection of moving photos from the American Civil War . Or, check out this stunning gallery of color photos from World War II .

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World War One

Stunning and Rare Color Photos from the First World War, 1914-1918

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Goofy vintage photos of World War One soldiers posing with fake military props, 1914-1930

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Dazzle camouflaging the warships with psychedelic paint jobs, 1917-1918

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Traumatic photographs captured by Frank Hurley show the horrors of Great War’s Western Front, 1917

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Color photos of the French army during the Great War, 1914-1918

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The only black soldier of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, 1915

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When Paris was protected with sandbags and masking tape, 1914-1918

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Rare photographs of military observation balloons of World War I, 1914-1918

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Hans Hildenbrand: The German front in rare color photos, 1914-1918

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The terrifying flamethrowers of World War I through rare photographs, 1915-1918

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The Belgian refugees in Britain: A warm reception that turned to resentment, 1914-1918

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Interned German sailors in North Carolina seen through old photographs, 1917

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Vintage Photos Show France in the Final Year of World War I, 1918

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The first Armistice Day in rare pictures, 1918

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When the British military industry was dominated by women, 1914-1918

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The horrors of Western Front through photographs, 1914-1918

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The United States during the World War One through rare photographs, 1917-1918

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Collection Newspaper Pictorials: World War I Rotogravures, 1914 to 1919

Pictures as propaganda.

U.S. newspaper coverage of World War I (1914-18) provides a unique perspective on wartime propaganda. The scope of articles and images clearly exhibits America's evolution from firm isolationism in 1914 to staunch interventionism by 1918. Once American soldiers joined the war, public opinion at home changed. And newspapers helped change it.

President Woodrow Wilson was reelected in 1916 with a campaign slogan: "He kept us out of the war." Newspapers from that year reflected this relative neutrality. On July 11, 1916, the first two pages of the New York Times were devoted to the visit of a German submarine carrying dyestuffs to Baltimore. There were photographs and stories of the crew—including a jovial interview with the captain, Paul Koenig, who spoke at length about his U-boat's on-ship library and Shakespeare. A December 10, 1916, photograph showed a German soldier mourning at a fallen comrade's grave. The dehumanization of Germans, a trademark of wartime propaganda, had not yet begun.

The president's eventual shift in wartime policy was mirrored in the newspapers. On April 6, 1917, the United States declared war on Germany. Headlines in the New York Times and the Washington Post over the next few days declared: "Call for 'Republic' in Reichstag; America Will End Autocracy by Entering War, London Thinks—German People Learning—And Our Taking Up Arms Will Complete Their Enlightenment" and "Germans Lose Hope—Strong Demand Develops for 'Peace Without Annexation.'—Conservatives are in Fear—Campaign Against Wilson's Appeal to Teuton Democracy." The United States was optimistic that the declaration of war would compel Germany to lay down its arms. This optimism proved unfounded. By June, it was evident that Germany had no intentions of surrendering.

Patriotic propaganda, as well as a succession of censorship laws beginning with the Espionage Act of June 15, 1917, went into full swing. Photographs in the rotogravure sections showed scores of young men registering for the draft—the American flag visible in more than half the images. Photographs of German soldiers ceased, as did any stories from German or Austro-Hungarian perspectives. Countless portraits of a heroic President Wilson appeared. In June the war drive became a competition to see which state, or even which city, was the most patriotic. The New York Times posted graphics daily showing which states had contributed the most recruits and purchased the most war bonds. As intervention became imminent, newspapers ran fewer photographs from the battlefield and replaced them with pictures of parades and training regiments. Editorial policies became even more vigorously pro-American once American soldiers began to fight in the war.

Five headlines from June 1917 summarize various aspects of the war drive: "Columbia Calls"; "New Police Arms Awe Socialists"; "American Liner Thinks She Hit a U-Boat; Came Up Alongside, Cook Poured Soup on It"; "[Germany] Went Exultantly 'Goose-Stepping' Over a Neutral People"; and "Germans Gave Poison in Candy." These headlines exhibit the insistence of patriotic duty; the criticism of pacifism; and the fault, inferiority, and heartlessness of the Germans. In a matter of months, the United States had rejected isolationism and embraced its role as protector of democracy throughout the world. The American newspaper had embraced a new role as well—no longer just a reporter of news, but an agent of public opinion.