The woman who devoted a large part of her life to creating and maintaining a museum dedicated to Violette Szabo, Rosemary Rigby, is joining forces with political activist, Zehra Zaidi, to campaign for recognition for the SOE heroine from the Bank of England.

The process to select the next character to feature on a £50 note will start tomorrow and Zehra, who lives at Longhope, near Ross-on-Wye, hopes to rally Herefordshire to vote.

Zehra explained that the big challenge is to reach people who know about the sacrifices made by the women who served in the SOE, but may not normally engage on social media. She hopes that local newspaper like the Ross Gazette will be able to encourage the county which has a proud tradition of military service to get on line and take part,

Violette Szabo? was one of only four women to be awarded the George Cross which is Britain’s highest gallantry award for actions for which purely military honours would not be granted.

Rosemary Rigby started the Violette Szabo museum at her home in Wormelow when she discovered that the SOE agent, called the ‘bravest of us all’ had spent many happy childhood times there.See this week’s paper for more stories like this, available in shops and as a Digital Edition now.