North Staffordshire Territorial Battalion Memorial Canvas

For the tenth annual reunion of the North Staffordshire Territorial Battalion at the Grand Hotel in Hanley, a memorial canvas was commissioned at the suggestion of Colonel Blizzard of the regiment. Consisting of 11 sections, its total length was sixty nine feet. The canvas depicted various episodes in the battalion’s history during The Great War – for example the battle of Loos 1915 (where Captain Oswald Bamford fell, a relative of the JCB family), Hill 60 (where Sgt John Carmichael of the 9th North Staffordshires was awarded a Victoria Cross, September 1917) and the capture of the Riqueval Bridge on the St Quentin Canal in 1918 (when “The Staffords won the war” according to military Historian John Bourne). It was a prominent feature at the reunions held in Hanley until after the Second World War, with attendances in excess of 300 former soldiers and boasted several guests who had been in the Regiments and awarded Victoria Crosses, such as Corporal Coltman from Burton on Trent, a stretcher bearer and the highest decorated Non Commissioned Officer in the Army, the 137th Brigade Commanding Officer John “Tally Ho VC ” Campbell, as well as Alan Jerrard the ‘Pyjama VC’ who had transferred to the Royal Flying Corps. The canvas probably saw its last use fully unfurled at the final Old Comrades Association meeting around 1975, although Nick Deakin, a former officer remembers seeing sections brought out for annual dinners of the Staffords into the 1980s.

What became of the canavs or individual sections is not known. It is hoped that the canvas can be replicated by Staffordshire Art Colleges and schools.

If anyone has any additional information on the canvas, The Chase Project can be contacted through this website or via [email protected]