World War I – Photo Album of Museum Quality: Kaiser Wilhem – Aircrafts - Large original Air reconnaissance Photos – Cruelties of war

A large photo album of 52 leaves, with dipped in photos on each side. There is a total of ca. 394 pictures; 189 original photos (9 aerial photos), 168 official buy photos and postcards, 27 collotypes (from a paper?).

The size of the album is 32 x 41.5 cm.

The photos in this album are unique documents, showing the unvarnished truth of war. An album that should have its place in a museum.

The album was collated by a young German soldier, named Hans Hugo, who was born in Roth, a small Bavarian town near Nuremberg, Germany. Later, he opened a photo studio in Roth, that existed until the 1960ies. Hans Hugo was at war from October 1916 until the end of WWI in 1918.

The photos are from Belgium, France and the Baltics. There are some exciting, outstandingly rare, large original air reconnaissance, serial Photos. The largest of them, showing a battle field near Riga, measures 25 x 47.8 cm. These photos are original contact prints that were used in the general staff for the planning of battels. They have an extremely fine resolution, so that, under a magnification glass, small details on the ground can be identified. Only a few original prints, like this one, have survived and today, they are the pride of museum archives.

There are photos from battle fields, downed aircrafts, destroyed tanks and so on. Some of them are of excessive cruelty, showing killed soldiers. Such photos were absolutely illegal, as they were not in line with the official propaganda.

Furthermore, there are photos from parades for high ranking persons: Generals, princes and last not least the emperor, Kaiser Wilhem II himself. These are original private photos by Hugo or one of his friends. These are not official photos. They are unique.

At the last pages, there are a number of photos showing Hans Hugo or his comrades. Some of them have very macabre comments, naming the date and place where they were killed.