THE LAST PARADE

At the end of the Summer Term in 1962 on the Sovereigns Parade as it was called Intake 29 marched up the steps behind the Adjutant on his white charger and through the doors of Old College. As you passed through those doors you became a second lieutenant .

Apart from one all my platoon made it : he had stolen a car in the last term and got thrown out .

What was Sandhurst all about ? My list would include : discipline , standards , tradition , history , fitness and chauvinism . That stated it was tempered with that famous British sense of humour and practical common sense . There was degree of intellectual stimulus but not really on a par with university .

The Army , and not just the British Army , tends to be a decade behind the social and moral mores of the nation .It has taken the British and American Services a long time to accept homosexuality in their ranks . Latent or not so latent at Sandhurst was the class system where you were labelled according to the school you went to , your accent and the clothes you wore .

Outside our cloistered world at Sandhurst a lot was happening .

In Feb 1961 Harold Macmillan's speech " The Wind of Change " heralded the decolonisation of Africa . This went reasonably smoothly with British Colonies except Kenya where we struggled with the Mau Mau . It was more difficult with the French in Algeria and the Belgium Congo . The Portuguese in Angola and Mozambique were a disaster . Apartheid in South Africa dragged on for another three decades and we did not come to a solution in Rhodesia till 1980 . Before the SAS got all the publicity the heroes of the day were white mercenaries with people like " Mad Mike Hoare " rescuing Austrian nuns from the Simbas in the Congo who were prone to eating their captives . Almost thought of becoming a mercenary after Borneo when soldiering in UK seemed pretty dull.

In Jan 1961 J F Kennedy was inaugurated the 35th President of the USA . Although I am cynical about the Kennedy clan at the time he seemed young , dynamic and vibrant, it was the dawn of a new era--the glamorous Camelot . Kennedy made our PM ( Macmillan) look like something ancient out of the Edwardian era .

Within the UK things were changing . I would not call it a revolution more a new dynamic and a surge of energy . The class system was being challenged. TV was having a greater impact which opened up new avenues for talent rather than us being dominated by Hollywood .

Pop culture took off-Cliff Richards-Tommy Steel and then the Beatles and the Rolling Stones . In parallel  there was a new dynamic in satire which mocked the establishment ; ppeople like Peter Cook in Beyond the Fringe .British cinema also took off with films like Saturday Night and Sunday Morning . I certainly remember in the Mess in Somerset everything would stop so we could all watch on TV That Was the Week That Was.

The Cold War went on apace and in 1961 the Russians put Yuri Gagarin into space (Apr ). The Berlin Wall was constructed in Jul . Meanwhile Kennedy had his disaster with the " Bay of Pigs "in Cuba .

There was always something in the news : DNA was discovered ; the Israelis captured Adolph Eichmann and Marlin Monroe died .

Writing this all seems heady stuff compared with my mundane problem of getting a trunk and two suitcases full of brand new uniforms back to Glasgow . One was given a uniform allowance to get fitted out with all the necessary forms of dress appropriate to ones new regiment . I did envy those cadets whose parents turned up in smart cars to spirit them away .

That is it for Sandhurst. Danger lay ahead but for the time being I had only felt at risk once when Mike Farquharson and I capsized in a double canoe in Pool Harbour and got swept out to sea by a fast outgoing tide .