Knitters hope wool poppies will catch on

c.hubbard@bepp.co.uk

Remembrance Day may be five months away, but one group of women are busy knitting poppies for the Royal British Legion to help with this year's poppy appeal.

Tina Williams of the Corsham Knitting and Crochet Club hard at work knitting one of the thousands of Poppies the group are producing for the annual Royal British Legion charity appealPICTURE: CHAS BRETON

The 100-strong Corsham Ladies Knitting Group, in Wiltshire, has taken on the daunting task of knitting thousands of woollen poppies to sell ahead of this years Armistice Day.

The group, which was founded ten years ago by Gwen Davis, started knitting the poppies in June and have come up with several designs.

Committee member Carole Lewis, 68, explained: "Originally we had a pattern off the Royal British Legion (RBL) on the internet but we didn't like it, it was too big, so Gwen set about designing a button-hole type poppy.

"We then got in touch with the RBL and they thought it was brilliant."

Mrs Lewis added: "We've now got four or five different designs, some are on hair grips for girls to put in their hair, some have safety pins and some have little sticks on so people can put them in gardens."

The group, who are grant-assisted are all paying for the wool and hope to make over 2,000 poppies for the RBL to sell in the autumn.

Fiona Dobson, RBL community fundraiser for Wiltshire said: "The Royal British Legion will be celebrating its 90th anniversary next year and it's particularly poignant this week, with the particularly high number of repatriations coming through Wootton Basset, to be reminding everyone to wear a poppy during Remembrance.

"These beautifully, individually knitted poppies will be on sale at £2 each and widely available throughout the county.

"The Royal British Legion would like to thank The Corsham Knitting and Crochet Group for their support and if anyone would like to offer any volunteering activities, albeit holding an event or simply helping to collect for an hour or two, please contact Fiona Dobson on fdobson@britishlegion.org.uk or 01249 783651."

The Corsham Knitting and Crochet Club is one of the local community groups who secured much needed funding from Community Foundation for Wiltshire and Swindon.

The Community Foundation for Wiltshire and Swindon have awarded a Grassroots Grant of £3,855. Grassroots Grants are to support small groups and organisations, many of which depend on volunteers.