Skip to main content
Tag

World War Two

The front cover of a book titled "The Premier's Clarion Calls to Courage" with an illustration of Winston Churchill.

World War Two Donation to the Museum

By Collections blog

We don’t know much about this recently donated booklet. It was printed in 1941 and contains some of Churchills most inspiring speeches. It is pocket sized so could have been taken anywhere in World War Two. You can imagine soldiers, airmen, sailors, air raid wardens, ATS workers and anyone involved in the war either in service or in the public reading it to raise their morale in their darkest hours. We hope this pamphlet brought the courage it was intended to stir and that you are enjoying reading it.

The booklet was made by a company called Valentine and Sons who were a printing company founded in Dundee in 1851 and grew to become Scotland’s leading manufacturer of picture postcards. The company was then purchased by John Waddington Limited in 1963 who then sold it to Hallmark Cards in 1980. Operations at the Dundee factory ceased in 1993.

The Devils Porridge Museum has two floors. The ground floor focuses on World War One and the first floor focuses on World War Two and the Cold War in our area. Hope you can visit us soon to explore both galleries. To find out more about what’s in the Museum before visiting check out the Guidebooks which we have in our shop: https://www.devilsporridge.org.uk/product/the-devils-porridge-museum-guidebook

Here are a couple of pages from the book below:

WW2 Coat

WW2 Coat and Badges

By Collections blog

This coat was recently donated to the Museum and has a large number of badges on it from WW2. It was owned by a land girl during the Second World War and was very kindly donated to the Museum by her family. Many of our young volunteers have been researching all of the badges and trying to find out what each one of them was for.

WW2 Coat

This is a photo of two of our young volunteers Calum and Finn researching some of the badges on the coat.

Young volunteers with WW2 Coat

We have now found out what all but two of the badges were for. The coat is in very good condition as are most of the badges (some are slightly discoloured).

WW2 Badges

WW2 Badges

Here are some of the most interesting badges:

Rainbow and Flaming sword: Post WW2 U.S. forces European command

WW2 Badge

Red Fish: WW2 British Army 2 corps badge

WW2 Badge

Red Witch: 2nd Anti-Aircraft division badge

WW2 Badge

Igloo with a star: Exercise Eskimo Badge

WW2 Badge

A Royal Navy ship at sea.

World War Two ammunition shipped from Gretna to Russia

By Collections blog

We recently received a copy of the article below.  It appeared in a newspaper local to the Museum, The Annandale Observer, on September 7th 1945.  It details the wartime shipment of ammunition from a Central Ammunition Depot near Gretna Green (Eastriggs?  Longtown?).  The ammunition was sent via the Arctic convoys to Russia.  We weren’t aware of this before and were very interested to find out.

 

gretna to archangel arctic convoy world war two

If you are interested in this region during World War Two, you might like this book, which was published by the Museum following local history research and oral history interviews.

The Solway Military Coast book

This booklet (which is included within the Solway Military Coast book), specifically looks at The Ministry of Defence depots at Eastriggs and Longtown.

The Ministry of Defence Depots: Longtown and Eastriggs

gretna to archangel arctic convoy world war two

Fabric badge from World War Two.

Mystery World War Two fabric badges

By News

Are you an expert in World War Two fabric badges or know someone who is?

We need your help!

Recently a lady brought in an old trench coat which belonged to her mother who was a Land Girl in World War Two.

On the interior of the coat there was multiple fabric badges from many different regiments of both the British and American armed forces from World War Two.

Through careful analysis of these badges and help from our good friend google most of the badges have been identified, however there are a few badges that have not. This is where we need your help. Below there are pictures of these badges and if you recognise one, we would greatly appreciate it if you could get into contact with us.  Email: manager@devilsporridge.org.uk

(1)                                                                          (2)
fabric badge

fabric badge 2

(3)                                                                 (4)

fabric badge 3 fabric badge 4

(5)

fabric badge 5

We hope that someone can help us with this and if anyone knows any extra information or stories about the Land Girls and their badges in their coat’s then please get into contact with us.  Thank You.

 

 

Translate »
BOOK NOW