[Sketch of mounted soldiers, ca. 1918-1930] / drawn by George Washington Lambert

SV*/Sp Coll/Lambert/4

fonds

ca. 1918-1930

Graphic Materials, Drawings

825836

Copy print : SV*/Sp. Coll/Lambert/4
Available on open access in the Mitchell Library Reading Room

1 drawing - 25.5 x 35 cm - pen and ink

George Washington Lambert (1873-1930), artist, was born on 13 September 1873 at St Petersburg. The family migrated, reaching Sydney on 20 January 1887. Lambert died on 29 May 1930 at Cobbity, near Camden. He was buried in the Anglican section of South Head cemetery. On the outbreak of World War I, Lambert was unable to enlist in the Australian Imperial Force in London. In December 1917 he was appointed an official war artist, A.I.F., with the honorary rank of lieutenant, and commissioned to execute twenty-five sketches and to paint 'The Charge of the Light Horse at Beersheba' on 31 October 1917. He arrived at Alexandria, Egypt, in January 1918. Despite contracting malaria, he embarked for Marseilles, France, in May with over 130 sketches, many of which were exhibited later that year at the Royal British Colonial Society of Artists' War and Peace Exhibition. In January 1919, as honorary captain, he visited Gallipoli on the historical mission with C.E.W. Bean. Bean noted that Lambert 'was, I think, more sensitive than the rest of us to the tragedy - or at any rate the horror - of Anzac'. Lambert impressed on Bean that he wanted 'a clear military "operation order" setting out the work to be done'. After recovering from dysentery in Cairo he visited Palestine, returning to London in August, 1919.

Reference:
Australian Dictionary of Biography Online edition.
http://www.adb.online.anu.edu.au/adbonline.htm
(accessed April, 2008)

An incomplete drawing of mounted soldiers.

George W. Lambert retrospective : heroes & icons / Anne Gray.¶George Lambert 1873-1930 catalogue raisonne by Anne Gray, 1996.

Unsigned. Undated. Untitled.