THE UNRETURNING ARMY
by David Frederickson 

Picture
Poster by Stephen Hepworth

The Unreturning Army is a performance of words, music and poetry, which looks at the impact of the First World War on the Derbyshire villages and the people who lived there.  How did they live through an upheaval that lasted four long years, took so many lives and then changed the world forever?
 
Ordinary people like Horace Johnson, born in Youlgrave, who fought at Gallipoli, who never spoke about his experiences until he was persuaded to write about it at the end of his life.  And Vera Brittain from Buxton, whose life at Oxford University was interrupted by the war, a conflict that robbed her of a brother, a fiance and friends.  It is the story of the men of the Notts and Derby Regiment - the Sherwood Foresters - which so many Peak District men joined in August 1914.
 
Performed by Peak District-based Cotton Grass Theatre, it is a moving story of love, loss, patriotism and great bravery, told with music, reminiscences and the soldier poets of the War: Siegfried Sassoon, Wilfred Owen, Rupert Brooke and others.


There will be two performances of this show around Armistice this year:

# BAMFORD VILLAGE INSTITUTE  Thursday November 8th 2018 at 7.30pm.  The show is free!!

# DERBY MUSEUM AND ART GALLERY:  Saturday 24th November 2018 at 2pm.  Tickets: £12 - go to the Derby Museum and Art Gallery website - www.derbymuseums.org