In a conversation last week with our 13 year old grandson regarding the Great War, my wife remembered she had, stored away in her box of treasures, a rosary given to her in the late 1930's by her grandmother. The story was that grandmother's brother had brought the rosary back from France and given it to his sister, but even this is conjecture as nothing is known about grandmother's brother except his name was Tudor and he came from Black Country in England. It is not known even if he survived the war. The rosary is obviously hand made with hand carved round beads made from bone that are linked with chain. The hand carved cross is unique in that in the centre of the cross ( not too accurately in the centre), is a very small circular brass holder containing a glass lens which if raised up to the eye with a bright light behind, reveals a collection of minute photographs. The heading above the photographs is ALBERT (SOMME), then BASILIDUE DE N.D.DE BREBIERES and BOMBARDEE PARLES ALLEMANDES with three photographs below. The first is of the original statue (VIERGE DE CLOCHER) of Mary holding above her head the babe Jesus. The second is of the Church ( AVANT LE BOMBARDEMENT) with the third photograph ETAT ACTUEL showing the church with the leaning statue at the top. There is a fourth photograph below the group of three but only the top is visible showing the leaning statue and it is impossible to read if there is a title. If one refers to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albert,_Somme the story of the statue and the church during the Great War is told and photographs of the rebuilt church with it's remade statue are shown. My interest is in the origins of the rosary as the minute photographs shown point to the origin being between the German original bombardment and the British second bombardment, there is no date shown anywhere on the rosary or on the photographs. The assumption has to be that this rosary was quite common and with a guess they were probably made for sale to the "visiting" soldiers, but was this during or after the war ended and who would have made them? Any information or comments would be welcome.