Page 79 - QDG 2022

1st The Queen’s Dragoon Guards
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Cpl Jones on the vallon (film photo)
A view of the field mid-search (film photo)
we sat with them outside a derelict house that they used as the ‘Hourara Club for Young Boys,’ that we in 1st Tp were all made honorary members of. The lads use this courtyard as a place to chat, drink tea, and listen to music all together without bothering their parents. They had no end of questions for us, as well as really enjoying English music and hearing how much our kit weighed. Something that has really stuck with me from that night, as proof that we did some good there, was a man of about twenty-two coming to us, being a former member of the Club himself, thanking us for our presence
as he shook all of our hands. He explained, with a lit
cigarette in his mouth, that he came up the river from Labazanga (a large town with a Malian Army presence a few miles down the River Niger) to see his parents after hearing that we were there. He went on to say that men of his age could not stay in the village for they would either be forced into a TAG or beaten, maybe even killed.
At our request, Ibrahim and the gang led us to the local shop and we happily spent some of our petty-cash on some drinks for the Club and the shopkeeper. We then returned to the Desert Box, for an early start lay ahead of us. As if the locals had not done enough to show us their appreciation of the security that our presence gave them, we patrolled
past a very jubilant celebration that they insisted we joined in on. A young couple had used our presence to get married and actually have a little party after it, an unreal testament to the effect we had. Even the frogs around us seemed to be having a shindig, for they would not give us a minute of silence!
The MoD have announced that the UK will withdraw from Mali this year, after only a couple of years. It is getting less stable there, and no one would want to have a British soldier get injured there, nevertheless, the presence of 1st The Queen’s Dragoon Guards made a differ- ence to the people of Hourara. If only for that day.
ZAK
LCpls Cox and Haden doing a boundary search (film photo)
‘The Major’ and the man going through the rations (film photo)
11B in full soar (film photo)