Roger Fenton (British, 1819–1869) Salted paper print from glass
negative 11 x 14 5/16 in. (27.9 x 36.4 cm) Gilman Collection,
Purchase, Alfred Stieglitz Society Gifts, 2005 (2005.100.67) In
1853, war broke out between Turkey and Russia over Russia's
expansionist policies in the Balkans, still under Turkish rule,
and the status of Orthodox minorities within the Ottoman empire.
England and France allied themselves with Turkey against Russia
in 1854. The allies already controlled the seas, but in order to
force a resolution of the conflict, they laid siege to
Sebastopol, the capital of the Crimea on the Black Sea. The city
held out for nearly a year, falling in September 1855. The next
year, the Treaty of Paris effectively contained Russian
ambitions in eastern Europe. The Crimean War was the first
large-scale conflict documented by photography. Fenton was
commissioned by the publisher Thomas Agnew and Sons to record
the theater of the war in photographs to be sold by
subscription. The images were intended to re