Label from gift food parcel sent from Australia to England - number 2

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c. 1946

Overview

Label from gift food parcel sent from Castlemaine in Victoria, Australia to Worthing in West Sussex, England after the end of World War Two.
The rectangular card is pale green with red printing and has remnants of the brown paper used to wrap the parcel around the outside. It is a customs declaration form issued by the Commonwealth of Australia. It has two stamps affixed to the brown paper to the right of the card, with the date stamps indecipherable. There appears to be a space where a third stamp has been removed or fallen off.
Information about the addresses of sender and recipient, contents of the parcel and their combined weight and value, and the sender's signature are written in black ink.
The reverse of the brown paper is plain.

Historical information

The recipient of this food parcel is unknown, but lived at 85 St. Andrews Rd in Worthing, West Sussex. It is likely that they were family members or friends of the sender.
If the parcel was not able to be delivered to that address, it was to be forwarded to Miss Ivy Ruth Sears, who was presumably an intermediary who volunteered for the British Red Cross Society, receiving and distributing food parcels. Ivy was born 4 April 1908 and was living in the School House at the address written on the label, Rowsley Rd, Eastbourne, East Sussex at the time it was sent.
The sender of the parcel was Louisa Margaret Woodall (nee Frye), born in Taradale, Victoria in 1913. She married Clive Grenville Woodall in 1945, prior to sending the parcel from the address shown in Castlemaine.

The items included in these food parcels would have been rationed in the United Kingdom after World War Two, and so would have been greatly welcomed. An article describing rationing overseen by the British Ministry of Food is attached as a supplementary file.
Several items are held in the collection relating to this time, including ration books, Ministry of Food Bakelite bowls and spoons, and a dried milk tin.

Details

Registration number

cwa-org-119-RoW00618

Item type

Themes

Social History
War and Conflict
War and Conflict > World War 2

Material

Card

Ink

Paper

Width

198 mm

Height or length

118 mm

Transcripts

Details on label:

Place to which the parcel is addressed: 85 St Andrews Rd, Worthing, England

Gross weight of parcel: 11 pounds

Contents: Gift food parcel. 12 ozs P. Milk, 16 ozs Dripping, 1 1/2 ozs Fish Paste, 12 ozs Meat, 12 ozs Cheese, 16 ozs Honey, 8 ozs Spaghetti, 16 ozs Tinned Fruit, 4 ozs Sweets, 22 ozs Soap, 8 1/2 ozs Soap Flakes.

Name and Address of Sender: Mrs C. Woodall, 71 Hargraves St., Castlemaine, Victoria, Aust

Instructions given by sender: If undeliverable as addressed, deliver to: Miss I.R. Sears, 1 Rowsley Rd, Eastbourne, England, Please forward to British Red Cross Society.

Unsolicited Gift Parcel

Keywords

World War Two

British Red Cross Society

Britain

Food

History - Social

Place made

Australia

Year

c. 1946

Primary significance criteria