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SURPRISES FROM A SERVICE RECORD

If, like me, you know family members were too young to have enlisted or been conscripted during the Second World War, you may not be aware that National Service was still in place until 1960.

So they may have a service record even if they didn’t serve during the war. When my father Garfield Williams was 70, our family offered him a parachute jump as a birthday present, to which he replied that he’d had enough of parachute jumping in his lifetime.

It wasn’t until he died that I found his Soldier’s Release Book and Certificate of Service. He had been called up and then joined the Territorial Army (TA). I applied to the Ministry of Defence for his record as stated in Rob Clark’s ‘Record Masterclass’ article (December), and was astounded at the wealth of information.

Garfield enlisted at Chichester on