To analyse, develop and raise
the understanding and practice of
Battlefield Guiding
The International
Guild of Battlefield Guides
the understanding and practice of
Battlefield Guiding
The International
Guild of Battlefield Guides
Mike St Maur Sheil
Mike St Maur Sheil has been neither soldier nor historian but through his work as a photographer has become fascinated by the landscapes of battle.
After reading Geography at Oxford he started working in Northern Ireland in 1970 where he was the first photographer to be allowed to document the work of the Bomb Squad. His subsequent association with the renowned New York based "Black Star" picture agency led to work on films and a wide range of editorial and corporate clients in over 60 countries around the world. In 2002 he won a prestigious World Press Photo Award for his work on child trafficking in west Africa.
For the past three years he has been documenting the "Fields of Battle" along the Western Front: work described by Prof Richard Holmes as "one of the most important ventures currently under way on the Western front". It is this work which has led to him becoming a battlefield guide with an almost unrivalled knowledge of the terrain of the entire Western Front.
In 2007 he created an exhibition of ‘battlescapes’ entitled - Fields of Battle - Flanders 1917 - to commemmorate the 90th anniversary of the battles of Messines Ridge and Passchendaele which has since been shown in Belgium and London and in 2009 toured New Zealand for six months.
In 2009 the Canadian War Museum in Ottawa mounted a six month exhibition entitled Fields of Battle - The Western Front 1914-1918 and he photographed Champs de Bataille de la Grande Guerre - traces et temoignages written by Geraud Benech & Laurent Loiseau.
In addition to leading tours to the Somme and Ypres he also runs specialised landscape photography courses helping keen photographers better understand the history and emotion of the landscapes of the Western Front.
He has recently been elected a member of the British Commission for Military History.
Verdun 2008
"The infantryman has no function except to get himself crushed, he dies without glory...at the bottom of a hole, far away from any witness".
Lt Raymond Jubert – "Verdun 1916".
Tyne Cot 2007
"I have many times asked myself whether there can be any more potent advocate of peace upon earth... than this massed multitude of silent witnesses to the desolation of war".
King George V.
Passchendaele 2007
If you want the old battalion,
We know where they are,
They're hanging on the old barbed wire.
We've seen them, we've seen them,
Hanging on the old barbed wire,
Soldiers Song – 1914–1918
Email address:
sheilphoto@googlemail.com
Web address:
www.westernfrontphotography.com
www.landscapephotographycourses.com
Telephone: + 44 1 367 870 276
Mobile: + 44 7 860 508 679
Mike St Maur Sheil has been neither soldier nor historian but through his work as a photographer has become fascinated by the landscapes of battle.
After reading Geography at Oxford he started working in Northern Ireland in 1970 where he was the first photographer to be allowed to document the work of the Bomb Squad. His subsequent association with the renowned New York based "Black Star" picture agency led to work on films and a wide range of editorial and corporate clients in over 60 countries around the world. In 2002 he won a prestigious World Press Photo Award for his work on child trafficking in west Africa.
For the past three years he has been documenting the "Fields of Battle" along the Western Front: work described by Prof Richard Holmes as "one of the most important ventures currently under way on the Western front". It is this work which has led to him becoming a battlefield guide with an almost unrivalled knowledge of the terrain of the entire Western Front.
In 2007 he created an exhibition of ‘battlescapes’ entitled - Fields of Battle - Flanders 1917 - to commemmorate the 90th anniversary of the battles of Messines Ridge and Passchendaele which has since been shown in Belgium and London and in 2009 toured New Zealand for six months.
In 2009 the Canadian War Museum in Ottawa mounted a six month exhibition entitled Fields of Battle - The Western Front 1914-1918 and he photographed Champs de Bataille de la Grande Guerre - traces et temoignages written by Geraud Benech & Laurent Loiseau.
In addition to leading tours to the Somme and Ypres he also runs specialised landscape photography courses helping keen photographers better understand the history and emotion of the landscapes of the Western Front.
He has recently been elected a member of the British Commission for Military History.
Verdun 2008
"The infantryman has no function except to get himself crushed, he dies without glory...at the bottom of a hole, far away from any witness".
Lt Raymond Jubert – "Verdun 1916".
Tyne Cot 2007
"I have many times asked myself whether there can be any more potent advocate of peace upon earth... than this massed multitude of silent witnesses to the desolation of war".
King George V.
Passchendaele 2007
If you want the old battalion,
We know where they are,
They're hanging on the old barbed wire.
We've seen them, we've seen them,
Hanging on the old barbed wire,
Soldiers Song – 1914–1918
Email address:
sheilphoto@googlemail.com
Web address:
www.westernfrontphotography.com
www.landscapephotographycourses.com
Telephone: + 44 1 367 870 276
Mobile: + 44 7 860 508 679
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Mike St Maur Sheil
Badge number
038
Area of expertise
The Landscape of War
1914–18
Passchendaele
Messines
Somme
Verdun
and the French battlefields
of north eastern France
Blenheim
