Joining Up!

Well my father often regaled us with stories of World War One and pre-war. He joined the regular army at the age of twenty one. The 4th Hussars which was Churchill’s regiment, of course. Then he was reposted to the 11th Hussars and he was in Ireland on the Kura, that was the Calvary’s school in Ireland, on the Kura. So I guess I was intrigued by all his stories and that was one thing. But what really happened I played soccer, football we called it on the west coast, same as in England. And I was playing at Royal Athletic Park one Saturday afternoon and a man came up to me after the game and he said, “How would you like to join the army? ” Of course, that was 1935, the hungry thirties and there was no work, of course, and people just lazed around or looked for, if they could paint boats for a day and that would be about it. So I was sixteen at the time and he said, “Well, you have to be eighteen. Never mind, we’ll get around that.” So as it turned out by the time they got the wheels in motion I was seventeen years and three days when I joined the Patricia’s.