During the first half of the century people often secured new positions through the use of testimonials and references, where former employers wrote about how useful and reliable a person was to help them secure future employment. As well as these formal documents when someone left a place of employment, letters and cards were also produced for meritorious service that could be added to a person’s cache of documents to show they were valued and had performed something particularly worthy of recognition. As well as this very practical role, these documents were a nice way of recognising employees who had gone above and beyond what was of expected of them in a formal manner and today we have one such card issued by the Army:

This card dates from March 1919 and was issued by the Army Gymnastic Staff, the forerunners of the modern Physical Training staff. It was issued to a DH Roden for his service with the British Army in France, presumably in some way involved with the physical training of troops during the First World War and its immediate aftermath.

Whilst we do not know what the card was issued for, it was clearly of importance to its recipient as it has survived a hundred years.