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"ARBORFIELD & THE SEPTEMBER 49ers"

A continuation of, and a tribute to

“THE SEPTEMBER 49ers & OTHERS”

Inaugurated 1st April 2001

Developed and Managed by George MILLIE (49B) until 1^st December 2006

on which date Trevor STUBBERFIELD (52A) assumed control

“The Older We Get, The Better We Was”

Army Apprentices Schools
K.C. Pre-1953	Q.C. Post-1953

Corps of The British Army in Which We Served

R.A.O.C.	Royal Engineers	R.E.M.E.	Royal Signals	Army Air Corps

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Foreword

As a foreword I here record the observations of T.E. Lawrence (‘Lawrence of Arabia’) which he made in his book “Revolt in The Desert”, a work written about the Arab Revolt during World War I:

“And it came upon me freshly how the secret of uniform was to make a crowd solid, dignified, impersonal: to give it the singleness and tautness of an upstanding man. This death’s livery which walled its bearers from ordinary life was sign that they had sold their wills and bodies to the State: and contracted themselves into a service not the less abject for that its beginning was voluntary. Some of them had obeyed the instinct of lawlessness: some were hungry: others thirsted for glamour, for the supposed colour of a military life: but, of them all, those only received satisfaction who had sought to degrade themselves, for the peace-eye, they were below humanity. Only women with a letch were allured by those witnessing clothes; the soldier’s pay, not sustenance like a labourer’s, but pocket-money, seemed most profitably spent when it let them drink sometimes and forget.”

“Convicts had violence put upon them. Slaves might be free, if they could, in intention, but a soldier assigned his owner the twenty-four hours’ use of his body; and sole conduct of his mind and passions. A convict had licence to hate the rule which confined him, and all humanity outside, if he were greedy in hate: but the sulking soldier was a bad soldier; indeed, no soldier. His affections must be hired pieces on the chess-board of the King.”

George MILLIE (49B)

“The independence, the adventures, disciplines, self-reliance and endurance we were taught to practice at an early age while passing through the Army Apprentices School made it somewhat easier for us to see and grasp a wider set of opportunities and responsibilities than others, as they did not have the benefit of our unique experience.”

“The fact that all we possessed amounted to little more than a kit-bag full of clothes, suitable only for living from the back of a truck, a packet of fags, and the ability to accept being sent off to anywhere in the World, to work inside or out in any conditions, was our lot for the first years of our working life. Some had to accept the misfortune of being shot at by unfriendly folk in foreign lands as being all in a day's work. Were we all really that mad, or just a little more adventurous than most of our contemporaries?”

“This may have borne some responsibility, and be the excuse, for leading us on to the vagaries and achievements that most of us ex-Boys experienced during a lifetime of working for another day, together with the ability to readily accept pastures new wherever and whenever they arose. I have never regretted my decision, taken at the age of fifteen, to join the Army Apprentices School and was proud to be part of the life, training and comradeship taught during my Arborfield years. In retrospect I hated academe anyway, and it was a relief to start something new and more practical.”

Max WARWICK (49B)

Effective 15.09.2006

Layout Revised and Contents Updated: 24th October 2012.

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