During the Second War World, British troops stationed abroad had the opportunity to send a recorded message home by making a one minute recording onto a 5 inch wax disc. In early March I was the after dinner speaker at a function when, towards the end of the evening, a member of the audience presented me with a record he had recorded in Naples when posted there in the 1940s. These records (still many of them around today) were known as Voices of the Forces and were a vital link between the front lines and families back home. The quality of this one was pretty poor after all these years, the soft material had no doubt been played many times with suspect gramophone needles which meant the record needed a fair amount of cleaning up.
Voices of the Forces
A Voice Record
The owner later sent me a second disc, this one even older, recorded by his wife when she was 5 years old in 1932 singing Pennies From Heaven. This was recorded in one of Lewis’s stores directly onto an aluminium disc and it seems was a common way to send a recorded message at that time. Being a tougher material it was in reasonable condition for a record that was nearly 70 years old. These discs were known as Voice Records with instructions to only use wooden needles. The B side of the record carried a general commercial for Lewis stores.
As you can see from the photos both records still had their original envelopes and now restored will be valuable family heir looms for the coming generations.