Grieve, Robert Cuthbert VC (Captain, b.1888 - d.1957)

Collection relating to the First World War service of Captain Robert Cuthbert Grieve VC, 37 Battalion. Collection consists of a leather bound handcrafted book, titled 'Comrades at Messines 1917', as well as a folder containing various loose pages originally contained within the book, concerning its history. On 7 June 1917, Captain Grieve was awarded the Victoria Cross for conspicuous gallantry in action during an attack on enemy positions at Messines. After the war, Grieve initiated an annual celebration dinner with the small group of men who had been with him at Messines, to commemorate the event. Known as the "Men of Messines", they met every year from 1919 until 1975, the book being commissioned in 1925 to hold the signatures of those attending. As members dwindled, a resolution was passed that the last surviving member of the group would bequeath the book to the Australian War Memorial.