Souvenir handkerchief
During the WWII years, a factory in the village of Yeroskipou was producing silk. The owner, the Lanitis family, was selling large quantities of silk to the British administration, which used it for making parachutes. At one stage, the British administration requested that the owner produce large men’s handkerchiefs, plain in design and measuring 46x59cm. They would take delivery of them and bring them to Nicosia, to the Government printing press. There, they would print on them detailed maps of Cyprus and the Near East and distribute these to pilots and parachutists of the Royal Air Force. So, if the aeroplane was shot down, and if the pilot or parachutists were captured, surely whatever documents they carried would either be destroyed or confiscated. But a dirty handkerchief in their pocket could easily escape attention and perhaps later lead them to freedom.
mmr-00058 > Souvenir handkerchief
You can see this exhibit up close, along with many others, in the 3rd-floor exhibition room of CVAR.
