Yale Center for British Art

Title:

Nurse's photograph album from Kinmel Park Military Training Camp.

Published / Created:

Abergele, Wales, 1917.

Physical Description:

1 volume (94 photographs) ; 17 x 22 cm

Holdings:

Rare Books and Manuscripts
D629.G7 K5 1917
Yale Center for British Art, Friends of British Art Fund

Copyright Status:

Classification:

Photographs

Notes:

The Kinmel camp was built in 1914 on the grounds of Kinmel Hall (near Abergele, Wales). The large basic training facility took over a substantial area of parkland, and had its own branch railway line connecting to the main line at Foryd Station in Rhyl. In addition to the medical facility, the camp also contained a number of stores, a Post Office, a bakery, a theater/cinema, and a number of churches. The camp included areas set aside for bayonet practice and trench fighting, a series of trenches being built both at Kinmel and in nearby Bodelwyddan Park. Despite the sense of camaraderie on display in the present album, Kinmel Camp ultimately gained notoriety for a riot which took place on March 4th and 5th, 1919, in which 20,000 war weary soldiers expressed their anger at their treatment at the end of the First World War. Five men were killed, and 23 were injured.

Photograph album probably compiled by a nurse working at the hospital at Kinmel Park Military Training Camp, near Abergele, Wales, in 1917. Of the 94 photographs included in the album, over 40 depict nursing staff, with a couple of the captions suggesting that the compiler worked in particular on the isolation ward. The majority of images are group shots depicting either the compiler's nursing colleagues or small groups of recovering soldiers; some also depict nurses with their patients. The opening image is a group shot of the commanding officers, matrons and nurses of the camp. Other photographs presumably depict male staff members of the camp. For the most part, the patients depicted are walking wounded, with only the final image capturing an internal ward. Two further images show patients reclining in wheeled invalid beds or chairs. A photograph on page 3 depicts a dirigible hovering above a group of soldiers on parade.

A small number the photographs depict the nurses off duty, in civilian dress. Some of these show the nurses in canoes (or punts).

Exhibition History:

Peterloo and Protest (Yale Center for British Art, 2019-08-16 - 2019-12-01)

Subject Terms:

World War, 1914–1918 -- Medical care -- Great Britain. | World War, 1914–1918 -- Hospitals -- Great Britain. | Kinmel Hall (Abergele, Wales) | Military nursing -- Great Britain. | Nurses -- Great Britain. | Kinmel Park Military Training Camp (Bodelwyddan, Wales)

Form/Genre:

Photographs. | Photograph albums. | Gelatin silver prints.