WW1 Memorial Quilt – Herbert – Fireman

For the last couple of weeks – I have been struggling with this piece, but it is finally finished.

It looks fairly simple now – but this is my second attempt. I decided that for a fireman I wanted to use orange and a design which included ladders and hoses.  I cast on and started knitting but I couldn’t work up any enthusiasm for the design.  It seemed too big and I kept putting off doing it.  I realised this was because it wasn’t right.  So I swopped it with another piece – in fact I have swopped several pieces around – so that the size of the piece better reflects the complexity of the design.  

I unravelled and started again, this time casting on 50 sts and knitting 132 rows.  A long thin piece seems to fit the ladder better.

This piece is called Herbert to remember my third cousin, three times removed: Herbert Tom Sedlen.  He was a sailor in the Mercantile Marine on the SS Royal Edward.  He died on 13 Aug 1915 aged 33.  In civilian life in Dorset, he was a fireman.

I now have 6 pieces left to knit but most of them are quite large and I intend to knit complicated designs.