Willie Carson

Who was Willie Carson?

Willie Carson was a Northern Irish photo-journalist. He was born in Derry. His photographs were published throughout the world at the height of The Troubles; his discretion and integrity earned him the respect of both sides in the conflict. His funeral was attended by John Hume and Martin McGuinness, and Ian Paisley led tributes to him in the Belfast Telegraph following his death in 1996.

Carson was an author of several books about life in "Derry Derry Thru The Lens", "Yesterday...", "A Decade and a Half" and "So this was Derry". A definitive posthumous collection of his photographic work named after his first book of 1976 - Derry Thru The Lens: Refocus - was published in 2006 by the Guildhall Press.

Leaving the Longtower School aged 10, a love of still photographs followed Carson through his work as salesman for the local Derry Journal newspaper and then into marketing, until eventually with four children under the age of five years, he decided to follow his heart and became a freelance photographer, never dreaming of what was to present itself as his subject matter with the start of the conflict in the North of Ireland. From local photographer he, along with many others, was catapulted onto an international stage. Photographers from all over the world visited and stayed at his home, using his back yard dark room to process their films and his front room to dry their prints.