I am very grateful indeed to Paul and also to Peter Parsley in Belgium for this - THANK YOU both.
It will take me some time to read and research the book but I will come back to it asap.
I should also like to thank Yvon, Di and Clare from Ballarat in Victoria, Australia. I saw a beautiful portrait of the artist Ted Cannon on Sally Ronchetti's Facebook page. Sally is the most amazing artist and I found Sally because she drew a portrait of Wilfred Owen for Dean Johnson of the Wilfred Owen Story in Birkenhead, Wirral Peninsula, UK.
I asked Sally if I could possibly use her portrait for an exhibition panel and she said I could. So I then had to find out more about Ted, which is how I came to be in touch with Clare, who put me in touch with Yvon and Di. They have a wonderful Facebook page called Mud Mining and Medals so do have a look at their work because it is awesome.
And as everyone is busy with poppies right now around the world, I thought I would share with you the lovely painting by Mary Riter Hamilton, courtesy of the Canadian War Amputees.
I am sure you all know the story of how the poppy came to be adopted as the commemorative emblem of the First World War - starting with Canadian Captain John McCrae's poem "In Flanders Fields" which inspired Moina Belle Michael to write a poem herself. Moina then vowed to wear a poppy in memory of all those in the Conflict. She went to a conference in Paris and the idea spread from there.
The British Legion (now called the Royal British Legion) adopted a form of the poppy as their official emblem. These were originally made by wounded ex-servicemen from WW1 in order to give them work. Now the RBL has even more work to do helping ex-service personnel in all manner of ways.
