For the first time in nearly 100 years art originally created for the first Imperial War Museum exhibition is on show again at Epping Forest District Museum in Waltham Abbey.

Shortly after the Armistice in 1918, several artists were commissioned to create art for the Army Medical Gallery in the Crystal Palace based exhibition.

In their number were local artists Walter Spradbery and Haydn Mackey - from Buckhurst Hill and Waltham Abbey respectively - decorated pacifists who had signed up to serve in the Royal Army Medical Corps at the outbreak of war.

Their experiences led the pair to paint strong representations of the front line.

Spradbery's watercolours showed the effects of war on the landscape, while Mackey produced portraits of soldiers.

At the time one review read: "A most powerful and truthful portrayal of the conditions of modern war, eloquent in persuasion against a recurrence of such things."

The Great War exhibition opened on June 9, 1920 in a bid to record the "toil and sacrifice" of Britain and the Empire in the Great War.

The building was crammed with displays of artwork, weapons, models, uniforms, photographs and artefacts connected with the war.

By 1924 four million people had seen the exhibition.

When the exhibition closed some of the art remained in the collections of the Imperial War Museum when it moved to its new location and others were transferred to the Wellcome Trust.

Sketches that Spradbery made for the exhibition works are now in the collections of Epping Forest District Museum.

As part of the special exhibition, 'Walter Spradbery, Artist in War and Peace', reproductions of some of the art can be seen hanging alongside loans from the Imperial War Museum.

It runs from July 21 until December 22 at Epping Forest District Museum, 39 - 41 Sun Street, Waltham Abbey.

The exhibition is open on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday and Friday from 10am to 4pm and Saturday from 10am to 5pm.