Have you noticed how difficult it is to tease war stories out of those who took part in World War Two? I have a friend whose father spent most of the war building railway lines at the behest of the Japanese. Sounds exciting, doesn’t it? Those of us of a certain age, remembering The Bridge On The River Kwai, or King Rat, were keen, when we were young, to get the true experiences of those who had suffered, but when we asked, all we got was “you don’t want to know”. They clearly weren’t willing to tell their stories.

My Dad was the same, and he didn’t go anywhere near the far east. He was in the Royal Artillery, crossing the Channel on D Day plus 3, and fought his way across to Schleswig Holstein, near the German/Danish border. He was wounded twice, once by shrapnel within an inch of his life, but he never told of his wartime experiences. The only things I ever got out of him were that he often slept by a heavy gun, which must have been quite an experience, and he was stationed in Nijmegen during the battle of Arnhem but was never called on to join the fight. He ended the war as a saxophonist with the Regimental dance band, which was his happiest contribution to the war effort.