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In about 1943 my grandad Archer Frederick Elford who was in the the army brought back two brass shell cases. He gave them to his father in-law called Alexander Millyard (my great grandad)known as "Pops" who was a sheet metal worker. He worked for a company called Allen West in Brighton that made equipment for the Army and some secret equipment for the Navy.

Pops made the shell cases into fire iron stands and punched a picture of a bird on to it. A set of fire iron stands consisted of a poker, a little coal shovel, a toasting fork and a brush. All that has survived in this set is the poker. Before my family and I found the fire iron stands, I thought that the war was basically all fighting and that sort of thing but now I`ve found out that people tried to make the best out of things to make their lives better and that people in that time were very inventive and clever.