Page 106 - QDG 2023

104 1st The Queen’s Dragoon Guards
The Valleys Branch
The Valleys branch RCA officially opened Nov 23. However, we could say the Valleys branch started during Covid, where we organised the meet up of Dragoons who were living alone and having no contact with people. We organised these meet ups on top of the Rhigos mountain where we complied with social distancing and brought our own food and drink to prepare i.e., Egg Banjos etc.
After lockdown these meet ups continued and grew in number, with many wives and girlfriends attending.
Since our establishment myself (Dave
‘Para’ Evans) and my two admin staff (Chuck Berryman and Ian Moore) have been reaching out to Dragoons who have been lost during time and enticing them back into the fold. Something that is slowly working with some of the old and bold coming back to join us after a long time away.
More recently we were successful with having ten Dragoons on parade in Aberdare for Remembrance Sunday, all flying the cap badge and representing the Regiment.
Prior to Christmas I organised a Christmas party for my wife and some of
her friends, at Bryn Meadows Golf Club and Spa. Word soon spread and I was surprised as to how many of the valleys branch members requested to join us, although this was not a formal RCA event. After the success and turnout for this party I can see this Christmas party becoming a formal RCA event for the Valleys Branch in future.
We have plans and ideas for the future of the Branch and we will continue to seek out our former mates we have lost over the years.
DE
South Wales Branch
The South Wales Branch has held three very successful get togethers this year. We have had two meet ups in May and January in the Ty Llewellyn Army Reserve Centre, slap bang in the centre of Cardiff and hosted superbly by 53 (Wales & Western) Signal Squadron in their bar. Our flagship event of year was The Néry Dinner and we sat and dined in style on Welsh Beef Wellington at the Masonic Hall, Cardiff. We dined and drank in honour of those fine Queen’s Bays attached to the British 1st Cavalry Brigade that had bivouacked for the night at the small village of Néry, whom at dawn on 1st September 1914 were surprised by the entire advancing German 4th
Cavalry Division in a devastating attack. However, the rifles and machine-guns of the Queen's Bays and one 13 pound gun from L Battery held off the Germans long enough for elements of the 1st and 4th Cavalry Brigade to counterattack and drive away the attackers in disorder. The
dinner was outstanding and was followed through in true Dragoon style till the early hours of Sunday morning, not quite dawn and thankfully no surprise attacks!
ME