After sustaining many high-ranking fatalities during the Battle of Inkerman, the British created a cemetery on ‘Cathcart’s Hill’, named after Lieutenant-General Sir George Cathcart (1794–1854), the most senior officer to be killed in battle at that time. The cemetery grew over the following months. Fenton focused on the impact of war through his melancholy images of the cemetery. The inclusion of a single, contemplative figure at the side of the graves was a motif used by other artists at the time.

From the collection of the Prince of Wales, later King Edward VII