Roger Fenton

Roger Fenton photographed military camps, officers, landscapes, and aftermath scenes during the Crimean War in 1855. His images are among the earliest major war photography projects, though they largely avoid graphic battlefield casualties.

"The Valley of the Shadow of Death" is Fenton's famous Crimean War photograph showing a road scattered with cannonballs. It was made in 1855 and remains one of the most discussed images in the history of war photography.

Two known versions show the same road, one with cannonballs mainly in the ditch and another with more cannonballs on the road. Historians have debated whether Fenton or others moved them, which makes the image important in discussions of staging and documentary truth.

Fenton worked with the wet collodion process, which required glass plates to be prepared and developed while still wet. He traveled with a photographic van, a major logistical challenge in 1855 war conditions.