The Heritage Buddy

This last week in history has been bittersweet; 22nd May 1915, HMS M.33 was launched and 24th May 1941, HMS Hood was sunk by the KMS Bismarck with a single shot. HMS Hood’s bell was salvaged from the wreckage on request from descendants of her crew. It is now on display at the National Museum of the Royal Navy in Portsmouth at the Historic Dockyard. There will be some upcoming posts on my visit to Portsmouth Historic Dockyard and HMS Hood, so please watch this space! 😉 Despite this was 2 days ago, let’s celebrate the launch of a little but fierce vessel. Please join me in celebration of HMS M.33’s 110th birthday! (Or should I say launch day)? 🇬🇧⚓️🍾 M.33 (M for monitor) was launched on 22nd May 1915 at Harland and Wolff Shipyard in Belfast to be part of a fleet of fighting monitor ships. She was ordered on 1st April 1915 and was built in only 7 weeks; the admiralty didn’t have a chance to properly name her! She is one of only three surviving ships left from the First World War and t...

8th May 1945 - Churchill announced Germany’s surrender marking Victory in Europe Day. ✌🏻 🇬🇧 8th May 2025 - marking the 80th anniversary of VE Day. I was so stuck for ideas of how I’ll celebrate whether that’ll be a living history object handling session or demonstration or hosting a tea or street party. I liked the idea of a wartime singalong karaoke session to overcome my vocal insecurities as an actor, but why not do a mini drag performance for my autism group with some costumed interpretation? The original idea was Home Guard or British Tommy, but finding a uniform was not only mega expensive, but also difficult to find the right size as the measurements of the outfits I looked at would be too big for me (surely there could be one out there equivalent to a modern day XS or S in men’s size or uniform designed to fit a teen boy soldier or a solider of a small build). I stumbled upon a Civil Defence ambulance women’s uniform, so I then had an idea of playing an air raid warden that ...

Before I left for my Pilates class this morning, I heard on the radio that a flotilla of “Little Ships” will be setting sail from Ramsgate in honour of the 85th Anniversary of the Dunkirk Evacuations. There will be a special Dunkirk post coming up very soon, but in the meantime, I was doing a bit of research to remind myself of the subject when on YouTube I came across this video by BFBS Forces News: It’s so exciting how they have preserved all these civilian boats known as “little ships” that helped rescue troops from Dunkirk from the increasing German occupation in France. These boats are considered veterans; the human Dunkirk veterans are sadly not with us as I have learnt the last surviving veteran has now sadly passed away aged 105. Veterans don’t have to be human, objects and animals are too. For now, here is a news story on the flotilla from the Royal Navy: https://www.royalnavy.mod.uk/news/2025/may/21/250521-dunkirk-85-sailing-with-coastal-forces-squadron They say that once th...

There is literally a lot for me to write about and writing continuous prose takes a lot of brain power that I lose at least two spoons (if you know the spoon theory and you fellow AuDHDers would understand how much energy it can take up). I will catch up eventually! On Tuesday 6th May 2025, me and a friend thought we’d spend the evening in Central London to see historic landmarks and bridges along the Thames light up red, white and blue for the 80th anniversary of VE Day (Victory in Europe Day). We arrived really early so we could take our time and not rush, starting with a slow stroll from Westminster and Lambeth down towards Tower Bridge via the Southbank to the Tower of London, thinking we’d get a good glimpse of the poppies. Making our way to the Tower of London, we stopped at the end of Hay’s Galleria for me to pose with HMS Belfast in my Agent Carter-inspired dress which is red, white and blue and considering the character played by Hayley Atwell in the Marvel Cinematic Universe...

Now that I have this blog up and running, what shall I start off my blog series with? I’ll start by explaining how the ‘Heritage Buddy’ namesake came about; it was at the height of the toy action figure trend via Chat GPT. I’m not a huge follower of AI generated artwork but I felt curious enough to jump onto the bandwagon. It took a frustrating good few attempts to get right, but what I did get out of those attempts was a very inspiring name. Because my name is HB, I typed into Chat GPT something along the lines of “create a toy figure of a heritage and museum worker called HB”, then despite the results not being what I was expecting, it came up with the following: Name: HB (Heritage Buddy) Appearance: HB is a cute, small figure with a friendly face and bright eyes. Dressed in a navy blue outfit reminiscent of a classic museum guide, complete with a white collar and a little badge that reads "Museum Explorer." Accessories include a tiny backpack filled with miniatu...

Let me Introduce Myself Hi, my name is HB, I use they/them pronouns, I am autistic and ADHD and I have a huge passion for culture and heritage.  My love for history began at a very young age when visiting museums, historic houses, castles, heritage steam railways, National Trust or English Heritage sites on family days out or school trips and learning about my grandparent's wartime childhoods.  Popular culture (particularly film and celebrities), war history (particularly the First and Second World Wars), maritime history, fashion history, women's history and living history are some of my special interests. The picture of me was taken in 2018 (when I had long hair), the year of celebrating the centenary of the RAF and commemorating 100 years since the end of WW1 at the Imperial War Museum Duxford with a spitfire since RAF Duxford was a key location during the Battle of Britain.  I have been involved with museums, culture and heritage for over 8 years now, including the Im...