The collection of badges on this hat may look like something a student might gather on their travels, but they were actually compiled by singer and actor Gracie Fields.

During the Second World War, Fields signed up for the Entertainments National Service Association, travelling to France to entertain the troops during air raids, performing on the backs of open lorries and in war torn areas. She was the first artist to play behind enemy lines in Berlin.

Her second marriage to Monty Banks, who was officially an Italian citizen, meant that if the couple had stayed in Britain during the war, he would have been interned. The couple therefore spent much of the war in the USA, perhaps at the suggestion of Churchill, who told her to ‘make American dollars, not British pounds.’ This she did, performing for the Navy League, the Spitfire Fund and Allied troops across the Americas and the Pacific.

Consequently, her fame in the UK faded, but she held a soft spot for her home town of Rochdale, where this hat now resides as a reminder of her war effort.