![]() Whereby a medal (always issued after an event, sometimes never even having been seen or touched by the “recipient”) could, I suppose, be classified as a “memento”, the tag was actually there at the event and can sometimes be the only tangible link to the actual person who wore it. They might only rarely receive pride of place above some mantle (more likely, they’ve been lost in some drawer bottom or pocket…or even binned without the blinking of an eye), but this seems to be the place reserved for the “shiny” mementoes such as badges and medals…no-one seems to want to see a framed disc of ugly red fibre or some cheap looking alloy. They also have the added poignancy of the fact that they were “there” through all the trials and tribulations of the original owner …even, on occasion, staying with him up until (and after) his death… Nothing can hit home harder than thinking about the feelings of some anonymous soldier’s wife as she receives the blood-stained tags that were worn by her recently departed husband. Maybe they’re not as “pretty” as a medal, but they are just as researchable (if not more so because of the information that they contain). Perhaps one of the most personal of all issue items to be carried by the majority of soldiers of the Great War, yet they appear to be one of the most understudied and neglected also. Introduction to Identification Discs and Tags of the First World War
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