Page 137 - Mercian Eagle 2014

Walsall and Bloxwich Branch
What a year we have had; to start with, we lost our great mate and Secretary, Andy Stokes. What can we say about Andy that most of you don’t already know, he was a real Stafford through and through and was a great Branch Secretary. Nothing was too much trouble for him and with the help
of his wife Alison, he did everything that he could for our Branch, so he is greatly missed.
We had a Christmas social with our local Cheshire Regiment Association Branch and a great time was had by all. After the New Year, we had a trip to the Leeds Armoury. On Saturday 28th June we had a collection for the Staffordshire Regiment Memorial at the National Memorial Arboretum in Alrewas and raised £325. It was also an attempt to drum up support for our Branch which is dwindling and joining God’s Army.
Our new President is Fred Mason, who fought at Anzio with 2nd Battalion, The North Staffordshire Regiment. He has been a member for many years and Treasurer for many years, so has a wealth of experience. Other trips included a trip to Tewkesbury in Gloucestershire and Llandudno, with our better halves. On December 11th we will be invading the Imperial War Museum in Duxford.
We were proud to have taken part in
the Commemoration of the start of the Great War on 4th August. We were actively involved with the planning with Walsall Metropolitan Borough Council beforehand and took part in the Parade and March past the Town Hall. We were joined by a team from The Staffordshire Regiment Museum who did a Kitchener Recruitment Stand
in the Town Hall along with other WW1 groups.
Andy Singer
Secretary
Giles Woodhouse was commissioned into The Staffordshire Regiment in 1994 and has served on operational tours in Northern Ireland twice, Cyprus, Kosovo, Iraq twice and was CO 3 MERCIAN in Afghanistan
in 2011. Glyn Ireland’s father was in The South Staffordshire Regiment and was
the first Quartermaster of 1 STAFFORDS. Glyn enlisted in 1963 and served in all the Northern Ireland tours from 1972–82; the Gulf War, 3 STAFFORDS and there cannot be anyone who served between 1964–1994 who does not know him.
Freedom of Cannock Chase
District Council
We would like to record with great pride that both The Mercian Regiment and The Staffordshire Regiment Association were granted the freedom of Cannock Chase District on Friday 27th June. It was a magnificent day for all of us who took part.
3 MERCIAN Parades
As these will be described in a separate article, we will merely add that The Staffordshire Regiment Association was out in force for all of them.
Appreciation
I would like to single out a few people who have been extremely helpful over the past year.
Staffords Band of Brothers with Branch Standards – Arnhem September 2014
• Greg Hedges has had another incredible year as Mascot Handler and does so much good in raising our Regiment’s profile.
• Trevor Evans for all his work as Parade Marshal at parades and funerals and for his work in Cannock Chase Great War Commemoration. Roy Painter for acting as Bugler.
• Dani Pritchard our Museum Curator, who has put in a huge workload all year and has done her best to link in with the Regimental Association.
• Mick Teasel and Burton Branch for all their hard work in planning the Reunion, making arrangements and setting up the Town Hall.
• Dave Lovell and Garry Gunner for arranging their Branch trips to Arnhem.
• Moz Wilkes and Foz Forester for planning and organising the ‘Staffords Band of Brothers Run from Lichfield to Arnhem’. This was epic, well done to all of you who took part.
• Lt. Col Tony Scott for taking on the laborious tasks of liaising with three embassies and numerous French, Belgium and Netherlands departments about the Band of Brothers Run. This was, as you can imagine, a tedious and thankless task, but vital.
THE MERCIAN EAGLE
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