ÃÛÑ¿´«Ã½

My father was born and brought up in the neighbourhood of Charnwood Forest. He joined the Leicestershire regiment in 1932 and was promptly sent to the North West Frontier. He returned to England just before the outbreak of war as a Sergeant and was a drill sergeant at a boot camp at Glen Parva just outside Leicester. Because of his knowledge of the area he was given instructions that in the event of an invasion he was to go underground in Charnwood Forest and form a resistance movement using Mount St. Bernards Abbey as a drop point. One of his first tasks was to blow up the Suspension Bridge in Nottingham as this carries fresh water across the Trent. In order to prepare for this he packed the bridge with dynamite so that all they had to do at the crucial time was to put in detonators. In 1942 he was sent out to India where he spent the remainder of the war and of course, invasion was forgotton about. In 1947 when Nottingham was preparing for the quintencenary celebrations they decided to paint the suspension bridge. Imagine their horror when the painters found rotting sticks of dynamite under the superstructure!

© Copyright of content contributed to this Archive rests with the author. Find out how you can use this.