ABSTRACT
The broadening role of the civilian in war was reflected in photography generally. However, as the prosecution of the war was increasingly dependent on the contribution of the civilian it seemed an obvious ploy to include the home front in official propaganda. For the civilian 1916 was the year when the war, which had been an affair for volunteers and a matter of slight domestic inconvenience, began to touch the whole nation. Although the supply of photographs from the battlefields remained its main concern, in 1917 the newly upgraded Department of Information began to consider including the civilian in official photography. To begin with press assumed that as in previous struggles there would be a clear-cut division between the military and the civilian and in their reporting concentrated on the enthusiasm and patriotism underpinning the mobilization and training for war. From covering the direct participants in war the press turned to its casualties; the refugees, the prisoners, and the wounded.
