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There was always something very much doing, what with a nightly soup kitchen, military chess, and photographic proclivities. I remember, for example, what I understood to be a battalion organized scheme for testing the Rushall defences, being completely transformed by the unheralded addition to the defence of a contingent of regular troops. Brain had brought them over from a local barracks especially for this occasion.

Eventually, Brain left us and Chapman took over, after Hackett had been brought in to B.H.Q. Chapman was a grand soldier with a fine record in the last war. He set about the company and made it efficient in its parts and conscious of its power. No company operated better than this new "G" Company on exercises, and no names deserve mention more than Chapman, Morris, Hooper, Richards, Martin, Nutting and Arblaster - to name only a few - for the part they played in the life of the company and the battalion.

And, lastly, our youngest company, known as H.Q. Coy.

Scott, the O.C., has always been ready to take on any job which needed doing. Shakespeare said : "Man in his time plays many parts." How truly can this be said of "Scotty". His company has not been in the limelight, simply because it contains the Signallers, D/Rs., Transport Section, etc., all of which play a lone hand in their respective activities, but excellent work

 

 

has been done by many members of this company "behind the scenes". In this connection I recall the names of Sergeant Callow, that untiring instructor on the signalling side, Sergeant Shenfield, who was responsible for the administration and who will be remembered for an excellent lecture at the Institute, Sergeant Bostock, Sergeant Carson, Corporal Bird, Corporal Allitt, Corporal Mobbs of Beacon fame and many others, among whom one must mention the energetic dispenser of our creature comforts over a long period, Corporal Aston, and that tall military figure who for so long was our evening guardian of B.H.Q., Sergeant Sleigh.

But whilst I have always stressed the importance of the company in an area like ours, I should certainly be guilty of neglecting a most important factor in making the battalion efficient if I did not say a word about personalities at B.H.Q. Trevor-Jones has already been spoken of elsewhere; also Jerromes, whose original job as Q.M. was taken over by Hackett, who came to us as a member of the permanent staff. Jerromes, after a short and fretful life with "H" Sector, became our Catering Officer and took under his wing the Beacon Camp, and his work there will be forever remembered.

Much could be written about the Beacon Camp. Sufficient to say is that it came to us through the kindness of the Birmingham Corporation towards the end of 1941. Thanks to the help given by Goode, we very quickly put the place in order, and the first 
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