Australians Advancing from Villers-Bretonneux, August 8th 1918. From Original specially painted for the Australian Comforts Fund. By Captain Will Longstaff. A.I.F. War Artist

London: Raphael Tuck, 1918. Ephemera. Good + overall. A Christmas and New Year's Greeting card from 1918-19. Issued by the Australian Comforts Fund, which was established in August 1916 to coordinate the activities of the state based patriotic funds, which were established earlier in World War I. Mainly run by women, they provided and distributed free comforts to the Australian 'fit' fighting men in all the battle zones.

The cover illustration depicts a very large and important battle, best known as the Battle of Amiens. The Australian Corps of four divisions with one in reserve advanced on a frontage several kilometers wide with a British corps (the III Corps ie. ‘3') on the left and the Canadian Corps on the right. The infantry advanced with tanks behind heavy artillery fire. No.3 Squadron AFC flew above. At the center of the picture is a captured German gun, one of more than 150 taken by the Australians that day. In left foreground is a Lewis light machine-gun crew supporting the advance of its own platoon (about 20-30 men). To the left a member of the medical corps attends a wounded man; the handling of casualties was one of the ingredients of the finely developed plan for that day. The open spaces depicted demonstrate that this was mobile fighting over a considerable distance quite different from the trench warfare of the earlier years of the war. (AWM)

Will Longstaff was born in Ballarat, Victoria in 1879. He served intermittently in the army from 1900 thru the end of W.W.I., in the South African Light Horse in the Boer War and as an Official War Artist working as officer in charge of camouflage for the 2nd Division AIF in France.

4pp, 6 3/8 x 5 7/8". printed in color with illustrations on each page. The 2nd large illustration is "Capture of Hamel Village, July 4th 1918, by Australians Assisted by a Detachment of Americans" by A. Pearse. Card quite foxed.