The Battlefields Experience

08/11/2024

As we gather on the Somme in France at the Thiepval’s memorial to the missing on each Remembrance Day the 11th November at 1040hrs.
For many everyday is Remembrance particularly for those from recent conflicts, wives children mothers fathers brothers sisters and muckers of our fallen.

They are not alone !

07/11/2024

17/10/2024

As history will agree !

16/10/2024

29/09/2024

The last original officer of 2nd Battalion Grenadier Guards of 1914 not killed or wounded, died on the Somme in September1916.

20/09/2024

09/09/2024

Geoffrey Malins recorded in how I film the Some,he reported to the 86th Brigade HQ of the 29th Division, in Mailly Maillet. Which is now my home on the the Somme

26/06/2024

Come and Join us, and swear you’ll never Forget!

05/06/2024

No words required but “Respect and Thank you for my todays “

13/05/2024

Lieutenant Shrikrishna Chandra Welinkar

Shrikrishna was born in Bombay, India in October 1894.

He was educated at St. Xavier's High School in Bombay and then Jesus College, Cambridge where he read history.

He had a keen interest in aviation and wanted to fly. He took flying lessons and obtained his Royal Aero Club certificate in August 1916.

In November 1916 he applied for a commission in the Royal Flying Corps but the application was denied. However undeterred and determined to serve he enlisted in The Oxfordshire and Buckinghamshire Light Infantry in February 1917.

In May 1917 he was granted a commission in the Royal Flying Corps.

He was posted to 65 Squadron which was a training unit based near Norwich.

He was injured in a crash while landing his Sopwith Camel on 13th August 1917.

Having been assessed as fit to fly again he was posted to 23 Squadron in France on 12th April 1918.The unit was equipped with the Sopwith Dolphin.

At 9:45am on 27th June he took off as part of an offensive patrol. He was last seen engaging an enemy two seater at low level near Peronne. He did not return from the patrol and was posted as missing.

He had been wounded and shot down. He died in a German hospital on 30th June.

Today he is buried in Hangard Communal Cemetery Extension having been originally interred at Rouvroy-en-Santerre.

Lieutenant Shrikrishna Chandra Welinkar was 23 Years old.

08/05/2024

Today pause to Remember VE Day

The act of military surrender was first signed at 02:41 on 7 May in SHAEF HQ at Reims,[2] and a slightly modified document, considered the definitive German Instrument of Surrender, was signed on 8 May 1945 in Karlshorst, Berlin at 22:43 local time.

German Instrument of Surrender, Article 2,

“The German High Command will at once issue orders to all German military, naval and air authorities and to all forces under German control to cease active operations at 23.01 hours Central European time on 8 May 1945”

Upon the defeat of Germany, celebrations erupted throughout the Western world, especially in the United Kingdom and in North America. More than one million people celebrated in the streets throughout the UK to mark the end of the European part of the war. In London, crowds massed in Trafalgar Square and up the Mall to Buckingham Palace, where King George VI and Queen Elizabeth, accompanied by their daughters and Prime Minister Winston Churchill, appeared on the balcony of the palace before the cheering crowds.

Churchill went from the palace to Whitehall, where he addressed another large crowd.

“God bless you all. This is your victory. In our long history, we have never seen a greater day than this. Everyone, man or woman, has done their best.”

06/05/2024

06/05/2024

Tonight the Last Post. Back under the gate for the first time after two and a half years!