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2023 - The Year of Growth

2023 would see the unveiling of four new portrayals and the public debut of two of them. It would also see our debut at two events:

 

- Tankfest, held at Bovington Tank Museum in Dorset

- Armourfest, held at the Norfolk Tank Museum in Norwich

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We would also unveil a portrayal which represents a force that has only really been coming to the attention of the general public over the last 20 years or so - the Home Guard Auxiliaries, who despite wearing Home Guard uniform, were not members of the Home Guard but civilians trained in sabotage and assassination. Their mission, albeit a very short one, was to cause havoc behind the lines of a feared invasion of Britain. This mercifully didn't happen, but the Auxiliaries were only disbanded in December 1944. To mark the unveiling of our Home Guard Auxiliaries portrayal, we would visit the British Resistance Organisation Museum at the Parham Airfield Museum. Business contact was made between them and ourselves with lengthy discussions had and enjoyed by all. In light of the visit, we are planning to visit Parham on numerous occasions in the future in the role of a Costume Interpreter, thereby giving a much more enhanced outlook on what the Auxiliary Units did.

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With the expanding business, it was decided that we would produce more uniforms so we had more of a diverse range to offer. July would see the completion of three new portrayals and the moving around of the current ones. The space provided by the lack of events and booking allowed us to improve the accuracy of the uniforms, including the moving of our officer portrayals onto the officer pattern uniform. Uniforms changed or adapted are:

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  • Major Tonkin, 1st SAS

  • Corporal Lynch, No3 Commando

  • Major, Lovat Scouts

  • Subaltern, Intelligence Corps

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The changes made to these uniforms enabled the creation of an Irish Guards portrayal based around circa 1950; and another family portrayal - Staff Sergeant 7641906 George Lynch of the REME. August would see the creation of another RAF portrayal, which in conjunction with the current RAF uniforms will tell the story of Commonwealth aircrew in the RAF during the Second World War. In a departure from the common theme, it was decided that the new RAF portrayal would be one representing South African aircrew. The most notable South African aircrew of the Second World War were "Sailor" Malan and Marmaduke St. John Pattle, both of which were accomplished fighter aces, each with over 30 victories to their credit.

Tankfest - Bovington Tank Museum, Dorset - 25 June

In this, our first visit to TankFest, we spent most of our time talking to our colleagues in Living History, notably to the Suffolk Regiment Living History Group with which information was exchanged and some technicalities of armoured vehicles explained to one of their newest members. When we weren't talking to our colleagues in Living History, we were engaged in educating those from the local Army Cadet Force about the development of the tank in the British Army from 1918-1945. There were two poignant moments were we paid our respects at two of the memorials at the Tank Museum, which was well received by members of the public. The level of interest shown by the members of the Army Cadet Force has demonstrated that providing such talks to Cadet Units is a very good way of educating young people as to what life was like for certain parts of the British populous during the Second World War. The one thing that most sticks out was the comparison of uniforms from the Second World War woollen battledress to the modern Multi-Terrain Pattern uniform: their individual strengths and weaknesses. We would like to thank those Army Cadets for their time and for their willingness to learn about their history so its mistakes have a reduced chance of being repeated.

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