Lou's Star Medal

As I have mentioned on several occasions, Beloved has been taking her photo prompts quite seriously and has garnered at least two picks of the day from the moderators of the group.

One recent weekly theme was red and when the more specific daily prompt of honour was added, Sue thought of her dad's war medals. We have a small box of them, and there is another grouping elsewhere in the family.

I put it in the back of my mind that I would also like to photograph a few of them, so about a week after Sue had completed her photoshoot, I roused myself to do just that.

I will only post one photo today, which will leave me with a couple more for some other time, possibly for Remembrance Day.

My vision was to keep it simple, and this was the simplest composition of the three that I took — a single medal on a black background with a lot of negative space.

Sue's dad received this medal sometime between March and August of 1945. The Star of Germany and France is what is inscribed around the edge. In the centre is GRI VI. That would be for George VI Rex Imperator. King and Emperor., unless someone can tell me differently. I understand that the six stars were for six different campaigns, the France and Germany campaign being one of them. The war record that Sue was able to obtain indicates that her father was awarded two additional Star medals: one for Italy and one, apparently, a general one. I will have to look in the box to see what else we have. His higher medals, if I may call them that, have made their way to other members of the family.

Although I hadn't originally thought to do this, I think I would be remiss if I didn't also include Sue's 365 photo and description. She arranged many medals and other treasures around photos of her father and grandfather.

Day 50 Red/Honour Honour - this is not a difficult decision at all today. My dad and my grandfather both served Canada in a war. WWI and WWII. I am not sure what my grandfather's position was during WWI, but I know he was at Vimy. My dad was a tank driver/mechanic during WWII and was wounded 3 times. When I went to the War Museum in Ottawa and looked down inside a tank I was shocked to see how cramped it would be for three men. My dad sat on an iron triangle seat at the bottom of the tank, and had two men positioned above him. They had to exit the tank before he could, so once he was in there he was the last man out. I was claustrophobic just looking at that space. I don't know how my dad did it. My brother and nephew have most of dad's medals, but I have a few in a box of treasures my grandchildren have sifted through and admired. Both men are worthy of honour indeed.