Hi, all:

A few weeks ago I read a posting referring the famous Robert Capa's "Falling Soldier" photograph and promised to look for an article I had read and found interesting on the same subject.

Well, the said article is on page 19 of the May/June 1998 issue of American Photo. I won't include a scanned copy of it because I wouldn't infringe the Publisher's legal rights, but summarize the article instead.

Carol Squiers, the author of the note in the In Camera section of the magazine, says that the debate about the authenticity of this photo has finally been settled and the anonimous falling soldier has been identified has the 24-year-old Republican volunteer named Federico Borrel García.

Borrel happened to be the only member of the Alcoy militia who died the day the photograph was taken at Cerro Muriano on September 5, 1936, according with old Spanish Government archives, and was identified by his brother Evaristo who also said that what he saw in the photo matches what he had been said about the way his brother had died.

All the above was included in a book tittled "Retazos de una Época de Inquietudes" (Sketches of a Turbulent Era) self published by Mario Brotóns Jordá in the village of Alcoy, Spain, in 1995.

Brotóns was a Republican militiaman himself and was present at the battle that day. He began investigating this subject after a friend told him he had read that the photo could have been taken in that battle and Brotóns recognized the particular cartridge cases the dead man used which had been designed by the Alcoy commander and made by a local leather craftsman. When he found the archives identifying the only casualty of that day in that battle, he took a copy of the photo and showed it to Evaristo Borrel who recognized his brother.

The almost unknown Brotóns book was read by Rita Grosvenor, a British journalist who was working in the South of Spain in 1996. She told Richard Whelan (Capa's biographer) about the book and he made it public in the "Robert Capa: Photographs" exhibition at the International Center of Photography in New York in June 1998.

There are more and interesting details in the article but the main content comes to what is included in the above paragraphs.

Capa's photo has been an important icon for many years and the truth about its authenticity is an important new for all photo adicts, I think.

Regards

-Iván

-- Iván Barrientos M (ingenieria@simltda.tie.cl), March 26, 2002

Answers

Newest Aperture, which I just got yesterday, also has a big article on this, and concludes photo is real.

-- Charles (c.mason@uaf.edu), March 27, 2002.

Here is the photo in question.

-- Matthew Geddert (geddert@yahoo.com), March 27, 2002.

This information has also been published in a recent (late 90's) history of the Magnum photo agency, which I have just finished reading. It's at home so I don't have title/author/publisher info at hand. Good to track down the source, and find the truth!

-- Mark Sampson (MSampson45@aol.com), March 27, 2002.

Thanks Ivan.

-- Bob Todrick (bobtodrick@yahoo.com), March 27, 2002.

Ivan

This controversy has been with the photo for at least 10 years if not longer -- the web tends to rechurn old ideas. I too was under the impression that it has been established as authentic. Naturally Capa was very "lucky" to get a shot like that. Of course there are plenty of pictures of people taken on the point of death or dying and they are rarely shown or exhibited for obvious reasons. Capa's one is historic and it has become an icon. I wonder what it would feel like to be a relative of the dead man...

-- Robin Smith (smith_robin@hotmail.com), March 27, 2002.

I would've run like HE// after taking the photo, as I would be the next to aim at.

-- chris chen (chrischen@msn.com), March 27, 2002.

Well then, if there was only one casualty that day, I would think it proves that the man in question is NOT the man in Capa's picture, as two different men were apparently casualties literally back-to-back, in the same manner, in consecutive frames.

Also, in my opinion the man in the photo looks considerably older than mid-20's.

It's interesting how all the explanations deliberately ignore the reason for the controvorsey. Unless Capa became Bill Murray in "Groundhog Day" I can't believe he witnessed, and photographed in the same position, two men being shot within seconds of each other, their bodies falling and arms splayed in the same manner, with one of the bodies (and residual blood that usually marks place of gunshot death) disappearing conveniently for the next frame.

That is what needs to be explained, not who the soldier might--or might not have--been.

-- dave yoder (lists@daveyoder.com), April 01, 2002.

It wasn't the only casualty of the day, it was the only casualty of that militia that day, according to the Aperture article. That would explain why the two men have different uniforms on. And if, as the article mentions, they were storming a fascist machine gun position, more than one would die.

-- Matt (mlpowell@directvinternet.com), April 14, 2002.