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Overview
This embroidered postcard was sent by Edwin Morse (Ted) to his wife Henrietta (Hetty) when he was serving in France during the First World War (1914-19). Both Edwin and Hetty had emigrated from Britain to New Zealand independently in the early 1900s. They married in 1912. When war broke out, Edwin volunteered for the New Zealand Expeditionary Force, and Hetty followed him to Britain where she waited for the war to end and Edwin to come home. After the war, they returned to New Zealand.
Embroidered love
During the First World War (1914-19), hundreds of thousands of men from the British Empire, including New Zealand, were stationed in France. French women and girls embroidered silk postcards for soldiers to send home to their wives, mothers, sisters and girlfriends. The anxieties of separation and distance fuelled a thriving industry of postcard making.
They were not ordinary postcards. Delicate silk embroidered with flowers, flags and messages of love and affection, were attached to card, but were obviously not robust enough to be franked and sent as normal postcards. Instead, they were carefully sent in their own envelopes, or safely tucked into letters. They were meant to stay pristine and beautiful, to be cherished by the recipient.
This delicate souvenir features the flags of the European Allies.