Cased Imperial Service Medal, 1st type, ‘Star Shape’ GVR cypher awarded to Joseph Hemmings, a Postman from Bristol and housed in its Elkington, London box of issue, who having retired in 1914 would spend five years working with the Young Men’s Christian Association with the troops on Salisbury Plain during the Great War.
Imperial Service Medal, 1st type, ‘Star Shape’ GVR cypher; (JOSEPH HEMMINGS) housed in its Elkington, London box of issue, the catch being broken.
Condition: box with minor scuffing on the corners, medal Nearly Extremely Fine
Joseph Hemmings was awarded the Imperial Service Medal in the London Gazette of 2nd October 1914. A notice of his death, published in the Western Daily Press on 18th May 1946 states:
‘The death has taken place after a comparatively short illness of Mr. Joseph Hemmings in his 92nd year. Employed until the age of 60 at Bristol Post Office, he was for many years an indoor head postman and was probably one of the oldest Post Office servants of his own class in the city.
Retiring from the service in 1914, he immediately took up work, very largely of an honorary nature with the Young Men’s Christian Association among the troops on Salisbury Plain, where he remained for five years.
At the conclusion of the war he became attached in a like honorary capacity to the Unity Home for the Aged and Infirm in Ashley Road, only relinquishing his regular morning visits when he reached the age of 80.
Becoming one of the first members of the Bristol branch of the Post Office Christian Association in 1888, he had taken an active part in its activities until quite recently and for a number of years was one of its vice-presidents.
HE was for many years a member of and a regular attendant at Stoke Croft Chapel (Eugene Street Hall) and in his earlier years took an active part in the work of the old Eugene Street Mission Sunday School and in the free breakfast services held there.’
