In The Army Now

Both my father and grandfather served in the British Army, though neither was a regular soldier.
My father was one of the last to do National Service and was with the Royal Signals. Despite heroic claims of fighting the Mau Mau in Kenya, the more prosaic truth is that he spent two years as a clerk at Catterick and never actually saw active service.
My grandfather volunteered when WW1 broke out and initially joined the Cheshire Yeomanry. Subsequently, he transferred to the Royal Camel Corps and served in Egypt and Palestine. My father always said that this was alongside Lawrence of Arabia and, whilst almost as fanciful as his own tales of derring-do in Africa, there is at least a remote possibility that TE Lawrence and HJ Cash may have both been mounted on camels in the same place at the same time!
Though they survived their time in the army, both are no longer with us - I never knew my grandfather as he died before I was born - so I felt it was appropriate to remember them at 11 o’clock this morning, along with all those who paid the ultimate price over the years upholding our right to freedom and peace.