Home / Browse / Art, Architecture & Design / Queen Mary's Needlework Guild. Its Work During the Great War. St. James's Palace 1914-1919.
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Queen Mary's Needlework Guild. Its Work During the Great War. St. James's Palace 1914-1919.
[Introduction by John Galsworthy]
Publisher: London: QMNG, St. James's Palace, n.d. [1919]
Stock code: 59475
Price: £200 Currency Conversion
First and only edition. Remarkable initiative to provide comforts for troops and supply items of kit, surgical equipment &c. to all the fighting fronts. Guild volunteer workers created over 15.5 million articles of clothing, and much else - for instance they cut some 3 million eye-pieces for gas masks out of cinema film when the German gas threat emerged. There were branches throughout the British Empire and beyond, including China, Japan, the USA and Canada. St. James's Palace operated as receiving house, store and despatch point for all these thousands of tons of goods. The full story of the huge undertaking, containing the report of the General Secretary followed by abbreviated reports from branches and an alphabetical summary of the branches, noting the names of the President and Secretary, date of affiliation, number of members, and the number of contributions. Wonderful illustrations, including group portraits from various branches, the "Victory Sock Week Collection" in Manitoba, and the work of the Surgical Requisites Association. Very nice copy and uncommon, no copies showing on COPAC or OCLC.
Quarto. Original card wraps. Photogravure portrait frontispiece, 38 plates, 2-page facsimile letter, and a folding map in two colours. Wraps a little rubbed and with a short repaired tear at the tail of the upper joint, some scattered foxing, but a very nice copy.
