Sparkling work at Hammersmith embroidery workshop

Lovely to spend a grey November afternoon at the Masbro Centre in Hammersmith, west London, where our volunteer Katrina Williams was leading an embroidery class. This is the fourth workshop we have done here - and this time people even arrived half an hour early so they could get started!
It's a wonderful group for older people.
Here's a quick photogallery of work produced.

Exhibition on Conscientious Objectors in St Austell

Very many thanks to Mike Berris who let us know about the exhibition at St Austell Meeting House, staged by local Quakers - featuring Conscientious Objectors in World War One. The exhibition collected little known information, and photographs, of the men who stood up for their beliefs. Many were imprisoned at Dartmoor.

Remembrance Day assembly at Richard Lander School, Truro

Great to be able to attend a Remembrance Day assembly at Richard Lander School, Truro, on Thursday. A big thank you to history teacher Julia Brindley who helped to arrange this. And many congratulations to the team of students who prepared such an excellent presentation on the autograph book that we'll be featuring in Heart of Conflict at the Royal Cornwall Museum, Truro (the exhibition will open on 17 December 2016).
Here are a few photos - the students were speaking to well over 100 in the hall....

Heart of Conflict - the details

A young woman in Cornwall's Land Army in WW1

I've been posting updates on production and research so often on Heart of Conflict... Perhaps it's time to publish the nitty gritty: 

Our new exhibition Heart of Conflict: Cornwall’s World War One will open at the Royal Cornwall Museum on 17 December 2016 and run until the end of June 2017. 

We’ve worked closely with local historians, volunteers and community groups to gather stories and material to display.

Thousands of men and women left Cornwall between 1914-18 to endure terrible hardship fighting the Germans in France and further afield. For those left behind, these were years of privation, anxiety, grief and extraordinary sacrifice.

Heart of Conflict – funded by the Heritage Lottery Fund – looks at how people  kept body and soul together during those years, how they lived and how they loved. It features some previously  untold stories of human bravery and endurance.

We throw a spotlight on families who struggled to make ends meet while waiting for their men and sons to return home, and young women who worked on the land, in munitions factories and in the mines. It also tells the stories of men forced to stay at home to do vital work such as mining, farming or fishing to keep the war machine going.

• Heart of Conflict opens on 17 December 2016 and runs until 30 June 2017 at the Royal Cornwall  Museum, River Street, Truro, Cornwall TR1 2SJ. Tel: 01872 272205. For more information email enquiries@royalcornwallmuseum.org.uk
• Museum opening times over Christmas and the New Year: The museum will be closed 24^th-27^th December and the 2^nd January.
• Normal opening hours: Mon-Sat 10am-4.45pm. Last admission 4pm. Open Bank Holidays. Admission charge £5.50 (including a £1 voluntary donation). Free for Under 16s.
  

 

Remembrance Day 2016 - a soldier buried at home

On Friday 11 November (Remembrance Day) at 430pm there will be a short ceremony at Stithians Church (led by Fr Simon Bone) organised by local Duke of Edinburgh volunteer Rhiannon Stevenson. 

Rhiannon has been helping us with research on our exhibition Heart of Conflict (opening at the Royal Cornwall Museum, Truro, in December) and found that there was (unusually) a World War One soldier buried in the graveyard.

Joseph Martin sadly died of his wounds at Bagthorpe Military Hospital in Nottinghamshire on 17 December 1917: his body was brought home to Stithians. He was only 22. He was in the Royal Berkshire Regiment and could have been wounded at the battle of Ypres earlier in the year.

He was the son of John and Mary Martin of Lansenwith (John Martin described himself as being in the meat trade in the 1911). We've been unable to track down any descendants as yet but will keep trying.

At the ceremony, Rhiannon will say something about Joseph Martin and read a poem she has written - we'll then lay flowers on the grave and sing hymns selected by Rhiannon, then the National Anthem.

Art workshop in Brixton

Great to be on Loughborough Road, Brixton, on Saturday at Gida, Jos Brient's new art collective there. We were offering people the chance to enter our competition for an African headwrap design, which closed on 31 October 2016. We're now embarking on the judging process - watch this space.