I beleive it was the custom of bereaved families to have family photographs taken to include those recently lost by using photographs. Ernest is the one on the left of the picture as you look at it. I believe the person on the right to be a realtive too but I have yet to identify him. My grandmother is the young girl behind the table with her father.

Two photographs of a group of soldiers and sailors. December 1919 at Versailles and the Louvre. From the cataloguer: The Versailles Treaty was symbolically signed on 28th June 1919 - five years to the day that Franz Ferdinand had been assassinated. However the Peace Conference did not leave Paris until January 1920 and smaller ones continued to try and sort out the 'new' European and Middle Eastern countries ethnic and 'real' borders. These soldiers and sailors represent some of the countries involved in the decision making. || I'm puzzled by the occasion, in December 1919, which brought together the group of 16 soldiers pictured in the two photographs wearing the uniforms of their different countries. Perhaps the ladies are translators. One picture is taken at Versailles, the other at the Louvre. The photos belonged to my father, Clarence Kenneth Frost, who served in the Royal Engineers and who appears in the photos. At Versailles he is on the right, and at the Louvre he is second from the left. My father has written his name, the location and a date on the reverse side - 12th December (Versailles), 15th December (Louvre). These I assumed were the dates the photos were taken, but the photographer, Ernest Wardavoir of 11 Rue Mathis, Paris 19, has stamped the photos with the earlier date of 9th December. Later my father was stationed in Berlin, living in the Saxonia Hotel, as a clerk in the Fortifications Sub-Commission, presumably involved with German disarmament. He was demobilised in March 1920 as a 2nd Corporal. What could have been happening? Perhaps this group represents the support staff for a conference of senior military personnel taking place in Paris. Most if not all of those present appear to be of junior rank. The group appears to contain several sailors as well as the soldiers.

Map of Arras, France – with pencil shading that perhaps indicated where the front line was. Book of postcards. Collection of individual postcards of churches and a communications mast. New Testament pocket Bible Amiens Front August 10th 1918 (Name in Bible is Philip A Chapman of 6th Blackwatch, Oudenarde Camp, Bridge of Earn, June 4th 1915). || Frederick James Wonson (No. 75565) was as a Sapper with the Royal Engineers. He was born in Cheltenham, Gloucestershire, but later moved to Bath after the war. He served in/around Arras and Amiens in France. Frederick was born in 1888 and died in 1968. Frederick was 56 when my mother Joan was born. Joan is the youngest of Frederick’s 2nd family as his first wife sadly died. Frederick didn't want to talk about the war and all he ever said when the war was mentioned was: “Mud, mud, nothing but a sea of mud.” His family have his campaign medals – he received two and the fact that he didn't receive the third possibly implies that he was not on active service from the outset of the war. The family know that Frederick was married with one surviving child before war broke out. At this time he was a telephone engineer and it is possible that he may have been in what was initially regarded as a reserved occupation. The family don't have any information on his service but his pre-war career may have seen him assigned to work with communications, particularly as he has a postcard of a communication mast in his collection of war-related postcards. Frederick was a religious man who sang in the church choir. His eldest son became a vicar and my grandfather was also a lay preacher. This may explain why many of the postcards Frederick brought back from France were mainly of churches. Frederick had several brothers, including one called James (the family have a photo at home of him with bindings round his legs). Sadly, James committed suicide in the early 1920s but the family don’t know why – it was something the family didn't talk about.