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The Scottish Colourist painter JD Fergusson was in his mid-forties when in 1918, Britain raised the upper age for conscription to 51.

Fergusson did not want to fight. But if he had to he wondered why artists shouldn't be accorded a special rank? In a letter to Alfred Yockney, Secretary of the British War Memorials Commission, Fergusson wrote:

"A committee of artists...writers, painters and others should be formed to decide how best to make use of the artist during the war and to decide what rank each should be given. Businessmen, workmen and others have the power to insist on being considered, why not the artist?" One reason for Fergusson's aversion to war was given by his wife, Margaret Morris and that was that he didn't like the army's khaki colour scheme.

Alfred Yockney proved instrumental in keeping Fergusson away from the horrors of the trenches. He secured for Fergusson a four month commission, sketching impressions for paintings at Portsmouth Docks.

Despite this commission, Fergusson was never an official war artist. And it wasn't until 1975 the Imperial War Museum purchased one of his Portsmouth paintings - fourteen years after the artist's death.

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