Poignant Souvenir

Wherever the Royal Navy based itself abroad, there was always an enterprising photographer who produced souvenir photographs for sale to sailors. Until the 1920s, Cabinet Cards were the preferred format - a thin photograph mounted on card. Quite often they were a real work of art.

This photograph commemorates the death of Stoker Walter Cochrane of HMS Minotaur who died in 1910. Wei Hai Wei was a town in China that was leased as a British Colony from 1898 to 1930.

HMS Minotaur was the Royal Navy's flagship on the China Station