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allowed us to meet old friends and make new friends within the RADC contingent.
As OC, Maj Rob Smith had the unenviable task of leading the contingent whilst also giving the words of command. Plied with plenty of Army Navy sweets and revisionary homework watching documentaries about the guards we were soon cutting about Tidworth making a passable impression that we knew what we were doing. A final dress inspection and confirmatory drill movements for the AMS Corps Colonel saw us cleared to move to the next phase. For the rest of the officer contingent, the job was, in theory relatively simple. No sword drill was needed (the joys of being ‘non-combatants’). All we really needed to do was walk in a straight line - how hard could that be? However, as we were to discover this was in-fact quite challenging. The soundtrack to my 3 weeks was ‘Capt Bruce left a bit, left a bit more’ or even ‘Capt Bruce where are you going, come back to us.’
It was then onto Pirbright to meet the rest of our parade contingent and learn the actual sequence for the parade alongside our counterpart for the day, the Intelligence
Corps. Moving in a single squad with a frontage of 12 people was a different ask. Especially with all of the officers having a tendency to stride off and try to make it to the Palace as quickly as possible. This would often end up with us too close to the band and unable to hear the words of command coming from behind us. On more than one occasion we would turn round to see the squad had ‘formed six’s’ whilst the officers were very much still in twelves. However, many hours of practice at Sandhurst and RAF Odiham later, saw us at a standard that was pleasantly surprising to the drill staff. Whilst it is unlikely, they will ever read this, our thanks must go to all the drill instructors we had over the 3 weeks. Far from being
the stereotype of a shouting guardsman, they were supportive in getting us all up
‘to standard.’ Even if a comment was made regarding my mark time: ‘Sir I don’t know quite what you’re doing wrong but you look like a mutant,’ which was followed by some attentive and good-natured remedial work.
For me personally it was a chance to catch up with colleagues from previous postings, courses and even my Army
Reserve career. Also, if we’re honest, there was a lot of time to catch-up as there was a lot of waiting around. This did have a certain novelty. How often are you eating ice creams at 0800hrs whilst hiding out of sight in the car park of Wellington Barracks. Equally the experience of marching down The Mall into Buckingham Palace gardens in the dead of night is something that none of us will get the chance to do again.
It was remarked by senior staff that in order to achieve success on Op GOLDEN ORB the contingents should be taken from already formed units wherever possible, as pulling people from across multiple units wouldn’t allow for sufficient training time.
If we’re honest the RADC is known for a different type of drill. Was the weather on the day truly awful? Yes! Were the crowds maybe as big as we expected; probably not. But most importantly we proved that, despite being pulled from over 20 locations, and operating well outside of our normal role, we defied the expectations and achieved mission success. That is, I think, something to be proud of.
God Save the King.
“History of the Royal Army Dental Corps”, published in 1971 The Royal Army Dental Corps contingent for the coronation in Aldershot © Director, Royal Army Dental Corps of His Majesty King Charles III, on 6 May 2023
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