Casualties Union annual competitions

Comprises correspondence, papers and photographs from various annual competitions.

A few files are prefixed with a number. These form part of an incomplete numbered filing system used by Casualties Union in the 1940s.

The first Casualties Union annual reunion was held on 12 September 1943. At the fourth annual reunion in 1946, diagnosis competitions were introduced for the first time. At the following year’s reunion, the competitions were advertised to external groups. Each reunion was held at a different site, forming the basis of the theme for the competition simulations, for instance a railway accident, air field incident, or dock workers accident.

The competitions evolved into the Buxton Trophy, introduced at the 8th annual reunion in 1950 by the then President St. John Buxton. This was a competition for teams of four from external societies and organisations run on a regional elimination basis. There were four trophies available: diagnosis; first aid; international; and youth.

A Junior First Aid Competition was introduced as part of the 47th annual competition held in 1990.

The events were initially called annual reunions. The were named annual meetings for the 7th, 8th and 9th events and from the 10th they were known as the Casualties Union Day annual competition.