Series 6: American Red Cross Mission to Russia

In July 1917, Wightman traveled to Russia on a medical mission organized by the American Red Cross. The mission was led by Colonel William Boyce Thompson. The Americans sailed from Vancouver, B.C. to Japan, and then traveled by the Trans-Siberian Rail Road through Manchuria, Mongolia, and across Russia to Petrograd. Wightman was issued permission by the Russian government to take still and moving film images of the trip and of war conditions in Russia. He was technically assisted in this by Lt. Harold Wyckoff, and was accompanied throughout his travels in Russia by a Cossack guide and translator, Capt. A. Ilowosky. In addition to documenting the mission's train journey, Wightman traveled to small towns in Russia and to Moscow and Odessa to take photos and films. He then traveled to the war front in Romania and photographed soldiers and hospitals there. In late October and November, Wightman traveled back across Russia and sailed home from China.

While in Odessa, Wightman was robbed of his passport, money, and photographic permits. Much of the correspondence in Subseries 6, Folder 1 relates to this theft and the subsequent necessity for emergency permits and passport.

The second half of 1917 saw Russia embattled and exhausted from fighting the Great War. One of the special subjects of Wightman's work, The Russian All-Women's Battalion, consisted of women training to fight, in response to some Russian men's refusal to go to battle. Most of the images from Romania show intense war devastation to small towns, and document the plight of refugees. Wightman's time in Russia coincided as well with major political upheaval. The overthrow of the Czarist regime by the Communist revolutionaries occurred in October 1917. Upon his return to the United States, Wightman gave many illustrated lectures and often discussed the Russian political situation and how it pertained to the end of the war (clippings and documents pertaining to these talks are in Subseries 6, Folders 9 and 10 below.)

The photographs depict peasant life in Manchuria, Mongolia, Russia and Romania. They show bread lines and vendors along the Trans-Siberian Rail Road. The All-Women's Battalion is pictured at leisure activities and in training. Russian and Romanian soldiers are also pictured in preparation for and at the frontlines. The Russian YMCA and its activities are documented, as is the flight of some early Nieuport British airplanes. In addition to these human scenes, Wightman photographed many historically important or architecturally notable buildings in Moscow, Petrograd and Odessa. While in Romania, Wightman had an audience with the royal family, and they are pictured at a soldier's hospital attending to patients. While in China on his way back to the United States, Wightman stayed in Peking and Shanghai, and took many pictures of street activity in those cities. He also photographed the Forbidden City, a complex of ornate temples and gardens.

The documents in Subseries 6 and 7 supplement the photographs and contribute to a more complete understanding of Wightman's experiences and views of his trip. Although none of Wightman's moving picture film is with this collection, the film log in Subseries 8 gives a shot by shot narrative of what kinds of activities he filmed and considered valuable documentation.

Wightman numbered a series of approximately 400 photographs of his trip which appear within the various forms below. Although he took many more pictures, this set seems to be one with which he lectured and from which he tried to sell prints to interested parties. The most coherent representation of this set is found in the numbered lantern slides which were originally housed in four wooden boxes with a typed index. The negatives and the prints (both in albums and loose) correspond to this numbered set, although an exact correlation of images does not exist between the differing media. A Microsoft Access database was created to provide quick reference among the different media. For example, if the title of a lantern slide is known, the database will show whether or not a negative or print of that same image exists in the collection. Each subseries below contains a complete (or a large part of the) numbered set, as well as additional and often complementary pictures.