Never forget their sacrifice

Also never forget that war is the absolute last resort and that wars mean loads of people, innocent or otherwise die, much better to get on with other countries eh?

Lancasterclaret wrote: ↑

Thu Nov 11, 2021 10:32 am

Never forget their sacrifice

Also never forget that war is the absolute last resort and that wars mean loads of people, innocent or otherwise die, much better to get on with other countries eh?

Sadly war's recently (since 82) been more of a go to strategy than any kind of last resort.

They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old:
Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn.
At the going down of the sun and in the morning
We will remember them.

Lest We Forget

I knew a simple soldier boy
Who grinned at life in empty joy,
Slept soundly through the lonesome dark,
And whistled early with the lark.

In winter trenches, cowed and glum,
With crumps and lice and lack of rum,
He put a bullet through his brain.
No one spoke of him again.

You smug-faced crowds with kindling eye
Who cheer when soldier lads march by,
Sneak home and pray you'll never know
The hell where youth and laughter go.

Remember my Grandad telling me when I was at Uni in Newcastle how he used to fix Spitfires at Acklington airfield in Northumbria

Everytime I saw him

Cheers Grandad for what you and the others did

Arguably this years remembrance day will be even more poignant due to many people not being able to mark events in person last year.

And now that all the WWI veterans have passed, and the WW2 veterans are dwindling in number at a rapid rate it's even more important that their ultimate sacrifice is never forgotten.

Our family sadly like many others lost several ancestors during both world wars, but we've also had kin serve in Korea, and we currently have a family member serving in the navy.

Whenever I moan about life, I always try and retain a sense of perspective that compared to what those generations endured we live in luxury, and a lot of that is because of their service, and for this we should be eternally grateful.

Lancasterclaret wrote: ↑

Thu Nov 11, 2021 11:10 am

Remember my Grandad telling me when I was at Uni in Newcastle how he used to fix Spitfires at Acklington airfield in Northumbria

Everytime I saw him

Cheers Grandad for what you and the others did

I feel honoured to, along with the rest of the family, have been able to take my grandad to Sword Beach & Pegasus Bridge.

He never really wanted to previously talk about it, but that trip we got many tales, both emotional and funny and is something I’ll always remember when specially now we can no longer hear those from him

Thinking of my late father who came ashore on Sword beach, D-Day 6th June, 1944.

Lest we forget indeed.

My grandad was a desert rat, fighting against Rommel in North Africa. He came home but not all his friends did.

Proud that I followed in his footsteps in 2003, deploying to iraq with 7 armoured brigade. History shows us we went there for the wrong reasons, but we didn’t know that at the time, and those of us who went, went with honour. Many good people lost their lives, and we should remember them all.

Hope the parade on Sunday is well attended, and hopefully I will see some of you there.

Lest we forget.

The generals that sent the troops 'over the top' only to watch them get mown down, surely he must have thought ' hang on a minute, that didn't work'. Senseless

bobinho wrote: ↑

Thu Nov 11, 2021 2:05 pm

Proud that I followed in his footsteps in 2003, deploying to iraq with 7 armoured brigade. History shows us we went there for the wrong reasons, but we didn’t know that at the time, and those of us who went, went with honour. Many good people lost their lives, and we should remember them all.

Spot on that.

Thinking of my Great Granddad who died fighting in the boar war. Also his son who died in the 1st world war fighting in Iran.
Both of their bodies remain where they fell, so far from home.

Also Huge pride for my Son 13 years as a Navel Officer,

WE will remember them

And everyone else who has or is still serving our Country

My Granddads medals sit proudly on the mantle piece today.

He was lucky enough to have a trade in the war being a mechanic. He got to do lots of different jobs. Very dangerous in a different way. From being a motor bike mechanic which helped him be a messenger on such transport to going on the ships to Russia.
From seeing men die from urinating in freezing conditions on deck to constantly being bombed.

When I say lucky, he was taken off a ship just before it set off as they needed him somewhere as a mechanic. The ship was bombed and didn't make it.

We will remember them.

Dyched wrote: ↑

Thu Nov 11, 2021 11:06 am

I knew a simple soldier boy
Who grinned at life in empty joy,
Slept soundly through the lonesome dark,
And whistled early with the lark.

In winter trenches, cowed and glum,
With crumps and lice and lack of rum,
He put a bullet through his brain.
No one spoke of him again.

You smug-faced crowds with kindling eye
Who cheer when soldier lads march by,
Sneak home and pray you'll never know
The hell where youth and laughter go.

Who wrote that?.....it's a good one.
I thought maybe Celine?

It's not one of Wilfred Owen's so I'm guessing Sassoon, no pun intended.


Indeed. "Suicide in the Trenches".

I posted this over a year ago and the pride has grown even stronger if anything.


A bit early, the 75th anniversary of VJ Day being this coming Saturday, but I think it's worth remembering the WW11 contribution made by Leonard Greenwood, dad to Bob and me, grandad to Hannah, Beth and Kate and, quite recently, great - grandad to Arlo and the many, many thousands like him.

Dad served in the RAF in India and Burma, having joined up aged 20. His rank was Leading Aircraftman which sounds rather grand but meant you could have been involved in anything remotely connected with helping running the airbase. The giveaway, I guess, is in the nickname an LAC was given - an "erk"...
He didn't do too bad, he was an armourer/rear gun technician working on Wellington bombers and, probably, Hurricanes and Thunderbolts.

As the war progressed, his RAF Wing, 910, consisting of squadrons 79, 146 and 261 - all defence/ground attack squadrons - would move through Burma to India as Japan's surrender neared.

In his letters to his Mum, our grandma, he often talked of every day being the same routine ...............fair enough, perhaps Dad's tale isn't one of derring do and swashbuckling escapades but his and the stories of many, many thousands like him who got back - and many who sadly didn't - should make us realise, even in these shameful times, how lucky and privileged we are.

The second photo makes me laugh. Jotted on the back....
"Left to Right
Rocky (Vincent Rock) Staffs
Albert (Rushworth) Yorks
Me (Little Moscow)
Brum (Jimmy Briscoe) Birmingham
Bill (Nungate) London:
I'd forgotten our home town, Nelson, a hotbed of Left - wing politics in those days, had earned its very own nickname.
Bless them all.

A couple of terribly beautiful songs from Eric Bogle about the First World War, performed by the Fureys and the Pogues.
Lest we forget.

https://youtu.be/ntt3wy-L8Ok

https://youtu.be/cZqN1glz4JY

Great granddad a stoker in the navy and served in the Dardanelles in WW1. Granddad an RSM Irish Guards WW2. Great uncle a desert rat, another a pilot who flew a Mosquito plane in Burma and lost his life. A great uncle who was a coppersmith in Halifax and helped make bouncing bomb components. A great uncle who served in the Indian army in WW2. I’m not sure what rank he was but became a major in the Pakistani army after the partition of India.
Very proud of them and of all those who laid down their lives for their country in both wars and conflicts that have taken place since.

I feel a strange affinity with a WW1 soldier called James Morgan who had he lived would have been my uncle although I was born some 30 years after his death in France just one month before the war ended. He had just had his 19th birthday and went 'over the top' to be blown to smithereens. No grave to mark. No burial site to honour.
He was a Burnley boy (young man) and had never been out of Burnley until called up to the army. At the time he joined they had abandoned the idea of the 'Accrington Pals' types of Regiments because towns were losing whole swathes of their young men in the same actions taking place at the same time.
My Uncles name was James Morgan and because the name Morgan was welsh ( although no known connection with Wales,) he was posted to a Welsh Regiment. One of his letters home complained of how all his fellow soldiers were speaking in Welsh and he had no a clue as to what they talking about!

Both my grandads, now deceased, survived the 2nd World War. One was an RSM and fought at El Alamein literally alongside 'Monty' then went with him through Scilly. The other was a dispatch rider carrying messages between airbases in Norfolk. I'll let you decide which one of them was happy to talk about it.

A great uncle was a prisoner of war under the Japanese, he came back a shell of a man,vague childhood memories of a grown madn just bursting into tears and leaving the room, sullen,irrational angry hated when we visited but as you get older and realise what they went through PTSD wasn't really known or treated correctly then, a lifetime sentence.

My brother went to the Falklands in 1982 aged just 18. Luckily he came home. Sadly a couple of his mates the same age as him, did not. He, like many before him, said it was just pure luck he survived whilst others didn’t.

The Secret

You were askin' 'ow we sticks it,
Sticks this blarsted rain and mud,
'Ow it is we keeps on smilin'
When the place runs red wi' blood.

Since you're askin' I can tell ye,
And I thinks I tells ye true,
But it ain't official, mind ye,
It's a tip twixt me and you.

For the General thinks it's tactics,
And the bloomin' plans 'e makes.
And the C.O. thinks it's trainin',
And the trouble as he takes.

Sergeant-Major says it's drillin',
And 'is straffin' on parade,
Doctor swears it's sanitation,
And some patent stinks 'e's made.

Padre tells us its religion,
And the Spirit of the Lord;
But I ain't got much religion,
And I sticks it still, by Gawd.

Quarters kids us it's the rations,
And the dinners as we gets.
But I knows what keeps us smilin'
It's the Woodbine Cigarettes.

For the daytime seems more dreary,
And the night-time seems to drag
To eternity of darkness,
When ye ave'nt got a fag.

Then the rain seems some'ow wetter,
And the cold cuts twice as keen,
And ye keeps on seein' Boches,
What the Sargint 'asn't seen.

If ole Fritz 'as been and got ye,
And ye 'ave to stick the pain,
If ye 'aven't got a fag on,
Why it 'urts as bad again.

When there ain't no fags to pull at,
Then there's terror in the ranks.
That's the secret - (yes, I'll 'ave one)
Just a fag - and many Tanks.

G.A. Studdart Kennedy (aka "Woodbine Willie") - a wartime chaplain on the front line.

A day late, but this is always worth a watch as a reminder of what Armistice Day should tell us, beyond the poppy fetishism.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=XruYsAmKLyU

My Grandad served in the Royal Engineers and as war mad kids, me and my brothers would quiz him about the war. He said he didn’t do the fighting, they just built roads and bridges etc. When we asked him about D-day, he just said he wasn’t there. We didn’t find out til after his death that his division landed on 7th June! Typical of him and his generation. Heroes all

Me and a few friends came down to London yesterday.
As odd as it may sound, we hadn’t clocked onto the date until arriving

After checking out of the hotel this morning, we walked over to Westminster, getting there around 10:50

It’s a surreal feeling being among so many people in silence

Myself and my dad attended the Glasgow service at George Square this morning, I'm pleased to report it had an extremely healthy turnout including many youngsters.

Burnley had a good turnout this morning.

Billy Balfour wrote: ↑

Sun Nov 14, 2021 3:16 pm

Burnley had a good turnout this morning.

Burnley was really nice today with a big turn out