Devastation Gallery

British trooper meets French woman on the road to Lille, WW1

A poignant scene captured by the Sphere magazine's special artist, Fortunino Matania showing a British trooper riding through a devastated French landscape and stopping to speak to a French woman and her child. According to the caption, the woman explains that her home has gone and her husband had been killed at Verdun. Date: 1919

© Illustrated London News Ltd/Mary Evans

WW2 - Bomb Damage to Houses of Parliament, London

In the course of the German bombing of London during the Second World War, the Palace of Westminster was hit by bombs on fourteen separate occasions. One bomb fell into Old Palace Yard on 26th September 1940 and severely damaged the south wall of St Stephen's Porch and the west front. The statue of Richard the Lionheart (pictured here) was lifted from its pedestal by the force of the blast, and its upheld sword bent, an image that was used as a symbol of the strength of democracy, "which would bend but not break under attack". Date: 1940

© Mary Evans / Grenville Collins Postcard Collection

Adana, Turkey - following the Armenian Massacre of 1909

Adana, Turkey - following the Armenian Massacre of April 1909. A religious-ethnic clash in the city of Adana amidst governmental upheaval, resulted in a series of anti-Armenian pogroms throughout the district. Reports estimated that the massacres in Adana Province resulted in 15, 000 to 30, 000 deaths. Turkish and Armenian revolutionary groups had worked together to secure the restoration of constitutional rule in 1908. On 31 March (or 13 April, by the Western calendar) a military revolt directed against the Committee of Union and Progress seized Istanbul. While the revolt lasted only ten days, it precipitated a massacre of Armenians in the province of Adana that lasted over a month. Date: 1909

© Mary Evans / Grenville Collins Postcard Collection