Lace making bobbins : Sergeant H L Brunskill, 5 Division Mechanical Transport Company, AIF

French style lace making bobbins. Each bobbin has linen thread wrapped tightly aroud it. Several of the bobbins are connected to a three centimetre piece of hand made lace.

Lace making bobbins associated with the service of 13182 Sergeant Herbert Lancaster Brunskill, who was born at Wagga Wagga, New South Wales. A motor driver by profession, he was nearly 22 when he enlisted in the AIF on 29 August 1916. He was promoted to sergeant on 24 October. Brunskill embarked for overseas service at Melbourne on board HMAT Persic, on 22 December 1916, with the Headquarters section of 2 Auxiliary Mechanical Transport Company. He arrived in Devonport, England on 3 March 1917. He arrived in France on 21 June 1917 with 5 Division Motor Supply Column, where he served the remainder of the war, excluding a period of leave in England in March 1918. While on leave he was transferred to 5 Division Mechanical Transport Company. He was severely reprimanded on 30 April 1919 for joy riding in a War Department vehicle on the evening of the 29 April. He returned to Australia on board HMAT Ulysses September 1919.This lace making pillow and the accompanying equipment was brought back to Australia by Sergeant Brunskill for his fiancée, Isabella Houston, who he married in 1921. The bobbins are wound with linen thread and several of them are still connected to a small piece of lace, approximately one inch long. In lace making, the bobbins must all be of the same type and of similar weight to maintain the tension of the thread and the shape of the lace.