The Battle of Loos Memorial

I am very glad to say that the costume and knitting created for ‘Tell Them of Us’ and the ‘Centenary Stitches’ exhibition continue to do their work in helping to commemorate the anniversaries of the First World War.

(c) Lincolnshire Echo, Ursula Lidbetter of the Lincolnshire Coop laying a wreath.

October 13th 2015 marked the centenary of a tragic day for Lincolnshire. More than 350 of the county’s men were killed in one hour. Almost all of the men who died on that day, have no known grave – many still lay where they fell.

(c) Lincolnshire Echo. Actor Lewis Foley (reading a poem written by a survivor from his hospital bed), accompanied by Amy Bevan as a VAD Nurse.

We were asked to help with the memorial event by supplying costumed actors for some of the readings. Their presence helped to make the service all the more moving.

(c) Lincolnshire Echo. Actors: Jamie Oliver Bendy as the officer, Lewis Foley as patient (in ‘hospital blues’) and Amy Bevan as a VAD Nurse.

Crocheted ties, knitted socks (complete with their ‘Kitchener Stitch’), cardigan and waistcoat (hidden) completed their uniforms and kept our actors warm on that chilly October day. The VAD nurse’s uniform and the soldier’s hospital blues uniform were created by Pauline Loven. The officer’s uniform is a mixture of original and replica and is still covered in mud from filming in a WW1 trench last August.

Thank you to the Manor House Museum for their advice on the the appropriate badges for the 4th and 5th Battalions of the Lincolnshire Regiment and to the Museum of Lincolnshire Life for lending the officer’s cap badge.

For more photographs from the event, please visit The lincolnshire Echo.