Arts
Graveyard Shift
I used to work in a cemetery. It was a dead-end job, but you could always bury yourself in your work! Oh, ho ho ho! I humbly beg your pardon. I shall start again. I [more…]
Biography
Arts
Æthelberht’s RFA Christmas
I know there’s plenty of former Pusser types on GP, and even a few who have sailed under the red duster. They’ll all be familiar with the Christmas routines for their respective outfits. I thought [more…]
Biography
The Right Way To Put Out A Fire (Finally)
In March 2013 I was appointed to RFA Fort Austin. Within NATO she is classified as an AFSH, that’s to say a combat stores ship with the necessary facilities on board to embark a helicopter. [more…]
Biography
Still Not The Right Way To Put Out A Fire
You may remember some months back I related a story of my first fire exercise sailing under the Red Duster. I was somewhat unimpressed having come from a different seafaring outfit where these things were [more…]
Biography
The Valet’s Tale
My name is William Carew and, until recent events unfolded, I was the valet to Sir Thomas Stradling of St Donat’s Castle in the Vale of Glamorgan. I entered his service while he was [more…]
Biography
The Wrong Way to Put Out a Fire
When I left the Royal Fleet Auxiliary in 2015 I joined a shipping company operating out of Barrow-in-Furness. It was a very small outfit which specialised in carrying nuclear cargo between Europe, the US and [more…]
Biography
Review – Hugh Trevor-Roper: the biography
When I first spotted this book in the library, I wasn’t sure whether or not to pick it up – I already had an armful to take out, and wasn’t looking for another one. Like, [more…]
20th Century
John Enoch Powell, MBE
If time could be conflated and the men of yesteryear come face to face with those of today…. I have sometimes wondered what JEP would say if he was here to speak to our present [more…]
Biography
In Memoriam – Tony Lucas, “Bloody but Unbowed”
When Allied forces surrendered Singapore 75 years ago, 80,000 troops became Japanese prisoners of war. For Tony Lucas, thus begun an ordeal that almost broke his body, but could not bow his spirit. It is [more…]