'Annesley Bay', Abyssinia Expedition 1868-9, panoramic photograph by the Royal Engineers

Panoramic image of Annesley Bay, Ethiopia, formed of three landscape photographs pasted together, mounted onto cream paper.

Museums have a global responsibility to better understand their collections, to more fully uncover the histories and the stories behind their objects, and to reveal the people and societies that shaped their journeys. To this end, we want to better reflect on the history of these artefacts in our collection – tracing their origins and then confronting the difficult and complex issues which arise.

Concerning the 'Abyssinian Expedition' documented in this photograph, even at the time, this episode was regarded as a shameful one. To secure the release of several British hostages imprisoned by the Ethiopian Emperor Tewodros II, Lieutenant General Sir Robert Napier gathered together an expeditionary force of 13,000 British and Indian troops, 26,000 camp followers, and 40,000 animals. In April 1868, the forces reached Maqdala, stormed the fortress, secured the release of the hostages, recorded the Emperor’s suicide (with a sketch) and took with them any items of value which could be auctioned off to raise money for the military. Under the stewardship of Richard Holmes, a manuscripts curator at the British Museum, the crown, chalice, and many other Ethiopian objects made their way back to England where they were deposited with various national museums. As Prime Minister, William Gladstone condemned the taking of treasures from Maqdala, particularly the gold crown and chalice, and ‘deeply lamented, for the sake of the country, and for the sake of all concerned, that these articles … were thought fit to be brought away by a British army.’ He urged that they ‘be held only until they could be restored.'

The V&A has a responsibility to celebrate these technically advanced photographs, shine a light on their cultural significance and reflect on their living meaning, while being open about the circumstances of their production. We expect this to be an ongoing dialogue about the history of the expedition and the place of documents such as these in our national collection today.

‘Two bulky sets of photographic stores and equipment (of which only one was used) were sent from England at the suggestion of the director of the Royal Engineers’ Establishment at Chatham. The equipment was supervised in the field by a chief photographer, Sergeant John Harrold, and seven assistants. Besides their other duties, the Royal Engineers used the camera to record scenes of the expeditionary forces, portraits of officers and landscape views. Although it is not known how many such photographs were made in total, a series of seventy-eight, including landscape views, camp scenes, sketches and portraits were subsequently assembled into albums and presented to various worthy institutions of government and science, from the RGS to the Foreign Office, by the Secretary of State for War in 1869. A number of the photographs were also used, along with drawings by various officers, as a basis for the illustrations in the official Record of the Expedition to Abyssinia.' (p74).
'Unlike commercial photographers who accompanied earlier and subsequent campaigns, the photographers of the Royal Engineers were not treated as privileged artists. Nor were they individually acknowledged on their photographs. Their work was represented as a collective record rather than a series of subjective studies.' (p81).
Chapter 3, ‘The Art of Campaigning’, in Picturing Empire, Photography and the Visualization of the British Empire, James R. Ryan, London: Reaktion Books, 1997.

Frustrated by a lack of communication from Queen Victoria’s government, in 1864 the Ethiopian emperor Tewodros II (Theodore) took a number of Europeans captive, including the British consul, Captain Cameron. The British response was a military expedition of huge complexity and expense led by General Sir Robert Napier. The expedition marched to Tewodros’s fortress at Maqdala where a brief battle took place. Britain won the conflict, but not before the captives were released and Tewodros himself had committed suicide.

The expedition, which involved more than 13,000 men and a journey of some 400 miles, received unprecedented publicity in Britain. Crucially, it was one of Britain’s earliest military operations to be captured via the relatively new science of photography. Two sets of photographic stores and equipment were sent from England by the Royal Engineers’ Establishment and used to record the landscapes, camp scenes and leading individuals associated with the expedition.

This panoramic image shows the expedition’s starting point at Annesley Bay on the Red Sea coast. The bay’s shallowness meant a vast landing pier had to be constructed, with use of Indian troop labour. The expedition involved many such feats of engineering, including the building of a railway line plus numerous bridges, roads, wells and pumps. These were faithfully recorded through photography as evidence of the technological prowess of the British.

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