The Great War: Coventry’s story

Informative exhibition at the Herbert Art Gallery and Museum in Coventry looking at the city in the First World War.

There was the usual selection of objects and tracing of details of the men who had served. There was a lovely water colour of a billet by Kenneth Wotten. I liked the information boards particularly the one with the best and easies to follow time line of the battles I’d seen.

Most interesting however was the section on the role of industry in the war including a piece on the men of the Coventry Fortress Company who all signed up as part of the Machine Gun Corps and become some of the first tank crews.

I also got a sense of a militant city. In late 1917 there had been a strike in the Coventry factories doing war work and leaflets were dropped on the city to urge people back to work. Also at there was rioting at the main commemoration service as former soldiers and factory workers were not included in the parade. Two incidents I had not heard of a gave a different colour to the usual stories of stiff upper lips.

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