This map of Britain was embroidered seventy years ago by
Joan, a young woman who would one day become my mother. Her war really began
when she and a friend, with the Nazi threat increasing daily, and impelled by a
mixture of bravado, patriotism and the desire for some excitement in their
lives, enlisted in the Women's Royal Air Force. Eventually, half way through
the war and with her appetite for excitement completely sated, Joan found
herself engaged in work of such importance that home leave was not an option.
Instead, she spent her brief leisure hours stitching a map of the British
Isles. In simplistic terms she amused herself by working a pre-printed design;
but it could also be argued that she, and others, escaped from grim wartime
reality by crafting an idealised image of a place which, when anchored by silk
thread, could become a once-and-future land coloured by nostalgia and hope.
Measuring twenty-four by eighteen inches the map is large
enough for its triple coastline to encircle more than sixty little symbols of
British-ness. Regional identities are celebrated as part of a whole United
Kingdom by icons such as the rose, thistle, daffodil and shamrock, the English
cyclist and fox, the kilted Scottish shepherd and Highland cow, the
'traditionally' dressed Welsh lady and Caernarvon Castle, and the pig and linen
of Northern Ireland. This Britain is a busy and primarily bucolic place; a
Cornish fisherman lands a huge lobster, a West Country farmer sows his ploughed
fields, in the Eastern Lowlands another digs among potatoes and cabbages, hay
is stacked in regional styles, apple trees and conifers promise a harvest of
fruit and wood, cheerful little boats sail among leaping fish in the North Sea,
while a whale even wallows happily in the Bristol Channel. Factory chimneys
smoking in the North and the Midlands, and the coal seams and slag heaps of
Tyneside and Wales make minimal
reference to the presence of industry in
an otherwise agrarian idyll.
But the barrage balloon floating over St Paul's
Cathedral, the intrusion of a corner of France in threateningly close proximity
to the white cliffs of Dover, and the flotilla of ships steaming towards the Continent are all
indicators of the historical context in which the map was sewn. Perhaps most
significantly, the top right corner of the picture is filled by an heraldic
shield, topped by a crown and supported by the lion and the unicorn, above
which fly the flags of the Navy, Army and Air Force. When I look at this
section I think of my grandmother, a policeman's wife whose three offspring each served in one
of the armed forces, allowing her to glow with vicarious pride at having 'done
her 'bit'.
 |
| Joan Witt |
Joan's map is no exquisite work of art. Embroidered
mainly in simple chain stitch and satin stitch it is not even comparable in
craftsmanship with the samplers worked by earlier generations of little girls.
However, it is a historical testament to wartime myth-making; an evocation of a
Golden Age Britain to be loved and fought for. Now, on an emotive level it has
the visceral appeal of all folk art, but for me it offers a tangible link to my
mother and a glimpse into the life she lived before we met.
Dr
Sue Elsley
No comments:
Post a Comment