Rare 100-year-old photos showing World War I in color

During the First World War, more than 1 million French soldiers were killed. From 1914 to 1918, when this tragedy covered the world, military photographers documented life on the fronts. Then, for the first time, color photographs of the war were taken, reflecting this terrible event and the battles that the real heroes fought, overcoming the pain and nightmare of the inhuman forces.

In 1903, the French brothers Auguste and Louis Lumiere patented an early technique for color photography - autochrom. And despite the fact that it was the first commercially successful process of photographing in color, it was only in 1935 that Kodak developed the Kodachrome color film. Only then did color photography become commonplace.

And even many years later, in 1983, only 50% of American newspapers used color photographs in their print.

Given all this, it is difficult to overestimate the significance and uniqueness of our photographs taken once by the French army.

The authorship of most of the photos belongs to the army photographer Paul Castelno. Priceless pictures show dramatic and vivid moments - from life in trenches to portraits of front-line nurses and doctors. These photos can not leave indifferent, because they are a piercing reminder of men and women who sacrificed themselves in this difficult period of history.

Two marines. Belgium, 1917.

Three patients injured in Laffo. France, 1917.

Dressing room of the theater in the army. France, 1917.

On the Swiss border: French and Swiss soldiers separated by fences. France, 1917.

Street kitchen. France, 1917.

A group at Hospital 66: nurses, soldiers, doctors. France, 1917.

Swiss military behind a fence marking the border. France, 1917.

Machine guns protecting the passage of the convoy in the extreme south. Tunisia, 1916.

Left: Abbe Even chaplain of the 51st division. France, 1917. Right: Sar Amadou. France, 1917.

Four Senegalese soldiers. France, 1917.

Shelter. France, 1917.

Swiss border. Swiss soldiers, french soldier and woman at the window. Switzerland, 1917.

Left: press sale. France, 1917. Right: three young nurses in uniform. Belgium, 1917.

Ambulances are waiting for the wounded. Belgium, 1917.

Heroes of Dri-Grachten: officers and soldiers. Belgium, 1917.

French lines in Het Sas, mutilated trees. Belgium, 1917.

Surgical Center Belgium, 1917.

Left: French military surveillance - watchman at the lock station. France, 1917. Right: front line trench and observer. France, 1917.

Three soldiers with conjunctivitis. France, 1918.

The telephone exchange is protected by sandbags. French soldiers wash their things in the tanks of the fountain. France, 1917.

Watch the video: 60 Rare Historical Colorized Photos you've never seen before - Colorized History (May 2024).