Military History

Military History Group - Scroll down for calendar. Click here for account of visit to ex HMS Dryad

The Military History Group had a useful and productive talking shop at Woosehill last Thursday afternoon. Twenty-one members came and we had apologies from Alan and Marion Povall, Leslie and Arnold George, Lynn Cooper and John Dixon. The group discussion took place because we had no volunteer speaker for this month, Alan Povall having had to delay his talk on Bismark for a month due to Marion's operation.

The main aim of the meeting was to look ahead at possible new subjects we can research and present and to investigate more places we might visit in the summer months. I must say that I was very pleased at the enthusiastic way the members responded to this and at the suggestions that came up.

I had earlier sent out an Email message with a number of possible topics we might investigate. These included:

World War 1 - The Battle of the Somme, the Zeebrugge raid, the 1918 German offensive.
The English Civil War - The Battle of Newbury, the Battle of Reading and the siege of Oxford. Some of these could include visits.
The War of 1812.
The Indian Mutiny.
" The Boxer Rising. "
South American Independence - Simon Bolivar, Admiral Cochrane and Engineer White.
Others, including repeats of talks from the very early days of the group.

In the case of the latter, these were given using either handouts or the overhead projector as visual aids. Some early talks might now be enhanced by being upgraded to PowerPoint and electronic projector technology.

Patsy Thornton and Bill McDowell, who brought up The Little Ships and Dunkirk and the defence of Dunkirk to facilitate the evacuation.
World War 1 - The German campaign in East Africa " World War 2 - Operation Goodwood, the breakout from the Normandy beachhead. (This prompted the thought that Operation Market Garden might also be a good subject for a talk.) " Prisoner of War camps.
World War 2 - 'X' craft operations
The Royal West Surrey Regiment Museum at Clandon Park as a visit venue. Brookwood is nearby with recovered Barnes Wallis's geodetic design bombers.
Portsmouth Dockyard, with the Mary Rose, Warrior 1860 and the excellent museum, for another visit.
The Mitchell Museum in Southampton as a visit venue.
The possibility of a group visit to France and/or Belgium with Battlefield Tours. Bill McDowell praised an organisation called Ledger Tours. The suggestion was well received and I will investigate further.

Also discussed was collaborative ventures such as those that have been a success in the past - Military Medicine Through the Ages, Women in Wartime and another one coming up in April, when Joyce Bird, Jean Pettitt, Maureen Raybould and Kay are going to entertain us for the afternoon. As the discussion of these topics went one, volunteers came forward to put some of them on. As result, we now have the following for next year (2010):

We then went on to discuss this summer's programme and Patsy told us that she knew the last curator of the Newbury Museum and that the lady concerned was an expert on the Battle of Newbury and Donnington Castle and would probably be able to act as a guide for our visit this summer. She might also come and give us a talk on those subjects beforehand. As a result of this and having spoken to Graham Berry and Patsy, I have had to alter our summer programme slightly. The visit to the Woodley Aeronautical Museum will now take place on the 18th June, a possible talk on the Battle of Newbury and Donnington Castle on the 16th July and a visit to Donnington Castle on the 20th August. A copy of the updated programme is attached.

Finally, the December meeting was discussed. It was generally agreed that the joint meeting with the Industrial Archaeology Group last December was a success and that it could be repeated if possible. Colin Mitchell had earlier suggested that "Christmas in Uniform" might be a good topic to pursue but ha since decided that there might not be enough "industrial" in that topic and suggested that something like "fortifications" might be better. I can see this being developed along the lines of; "Stone Age Hill Forts - Subsistence and Defence", "Roman Forts on Hadrian's Wall - What Were Living Conditions Like?" and "Palmerstone's Follies - Logistics and Manning". Can anyone come up with alternatives? I assume that Colin will take this up with the Industrial Archaeology Group and that their members may have good ideas on suitable topics, too. We have some time to think about this one.

I think that that winds up the meeting. I much appreciated the kind round of applause that followed Stephen Smith's compliments on the continued stewardship of the group, and can say that a group like ours is only as good as its members and that, in my view, our members are as good as they get. Thank you all for your continued support.