melissadrummond

Flowers & Views of the Holy Land was a souvenir my grandfather, Bill, brought back from the Middle East after World War Two. He served in the 2/1st Machine Gun Battalion. The 2/1st suffered heavy losses in Greece and Crete, so in 1941 they retreated to Palestine to rebuild, where they were stationed around Gaza. While Bill was there he acquired this book, and another small photobook featuring photos of Jerusalem.

The battalion was eventually redeployed to Syria for garrison duties, and then called back to Australia when Japan entered the war, before moving on to New Guinea and, finally, Borneo (source: 2/1st Machine Gun Battalion (Australia)).

I recently saw a similar image of pressed flowers on @informedhistory’s Instagram, from a Palestinian souvenir book from the early 1900s, and thought it was worth sharing photos of this copy. They’re beautiful, well-preserved flowers, and the book is an incredibly poignant step back in time.