By the time Washington Post photographer Michel du Cille went to Liberia to chronicle the Ebola epidemic, he was a veteran at covering crises.
The three-time Pulitzer Prize winner, for the Miami Herald and The Post, had won for the coverage of a volcano eruption in Colombia (1985), detailing life inside a crack house in Miami and its devastating impact on a Miami community (1987) and investigating the treatment of veterans at Walter Reed Army Medical Center (2008).
He also covered civil wars in Liberia and Sierra Leone in the 1990s and, as an editor, directed The Post’s Pulitzer-winning photographic coverage of the Haitian earthquake in 2010.
He died of a heart attack in December while on assignment, for the third time, in Liberia.
His memorial service in January was standing-room-only in the 500-seat auditorium at the Newseum in Washington. Colleagues described how time and again du Cille would move in closer for a shot, sometimes dodging gunfire. He never hesitated. Like most journalists committed to getting the story and depicting it as accurately as possible, du Cille went toward the danger, not away from it.
“It’s what we do,” he often said.
While he was as accomplished an editor as he was a photographer, Du Cille was most comfortable in the field.
After a long stint on the desk, a bout with multiple myeloma bone cancer and knee replacement surgery, du Cille said he needed to get back to the action, to tell the stories of the suffering and do it in a way that allowed his subjects to maintain their dignity.
“It’s what we do.”
He was, quite simply, amazing. He also was my friend and former colleague.
I last spoke with him in detail last fall after Syracuse University rescinded an invitation to have him address journalism students at a workshop when administrators voiced concern that he might be infected with the highly contagious Ebola virus, even though du Cille had passed the 21-day watch period for symptoms.
I wanted to explore the possibility of having him come to Morgan if I could get it cleared with administrators. He was on his way back to Liberia for a second tour, but arranged with his bosses to get me permission to reprint his article and photos about the importance of his work in Liberia. That package appears in this issue.
In November, we had a brief exchange when du Cille talked via Skype with the Trotter Group of African American columnists, which was meeting at Jackson State University in Mississippi.
"I believe that the world must see how horrible and dehumanizing are the effects of Ebola," he told the group. He also said that rather than go in and out of the country for weeks at a time, as he had been assigned, he wanted to just stay in Liberia until the crisis ended.
"After eight trips to the African continent, I never tire or complain about the harshness of life,” he told the online column Journal-isms on Oct. 13 by email. “To me each journey there is an almost spiritual experience.”
Our mission as journalists is to tell stories that need to be told with accuracy, empathy and respect. We go where others will not or cannot go to get the job done.
It’s what we do.
Letter from the editor
5
Jackie Jones
chair, Department of Multimedia Journalism